Terrorism in the name of Allah - Islamic fundamentalism as sign of the 'Clash of civilizations'? (ePub)

Seminar paper from the year 2001 in the subject Politics - International Politics - Region: Near East, Near Orient, U.S. Naval Academy, course: Naval Academy Foreign Affairs Conference 2001 - Terrorism: Old conflicts in new clothing?, language: English, abstract: Introduction

"On 26th February 1993, at approximately 12.18 p.m., an improvised explosive device exploded on the second level of the World Trade Center parking basement..."(1) Killing five people and injuring a couple of hundred people, the World Trade Center bombing still is present in the USA. "On Wednesday, 21 December 1988 at 7:03 pm GMT a Boeing 747 airliner owned and operated by Pan American World Airlines and cruising at 31,000 feet exploded above the small town of Lockerbie. Pan Am Flight 103 had taken off from London Heathrow some 38 minutes before and was en route to JFK Airport in New York. Aboard the aircraft were 243 passengers and a crew of sixteen. None survived.", another tragic moment in world history(2). What do these two incidents have in common? They are both acts of international terrorism. But they share another common characteristic. They are religious motivated acts of terrorism. And this is quite important. In my personal opinion this kind of terrorism is rapidly increasing.
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1 Compare to URL: http://www.interpol.int/Public/Publications/ICPR/ICPR469_3.asp (3-21-01)
2 Compare to URL: http://www.thelockerbietrial.com/from_lockerbie_to_zeist.htm (3-21-01)