Terror

Israel, Palestine, and Terror, edited by Stephen Law, Continuum (2008): 17-33

Tomis Kapitan

1. Defining Terrorism

Any intelligent discussion of terrorism must demarcate its subject matter, for the term

terrorism is differently understood and where there is no accord on its meaning there is

little chance for agreement on its application or normative status. The best course is to

sketch a morally neutral definition that classifies as terrorist as many widely-agreed

upon cases as possible. Definitions that explicitly render terrorism illegitimate make

classification contentious, and it is more informative to base moral assessment on an

examination of the case rather than through apriori stipulation.

Most writers on the topic agree that terrorism is (i) a deliberate use or threat of

violence, (ii) politically-motivated, and (iii) directed against non-military personnel, that

is, against civilians or noncombatants. Taking these as the only essential features of

terrorism, the simplest and more accurate reportive definition is this:

Terrorism is deliberate, politically-motivated violence, or the threat of such, directed

against civilians.1

By contrast, Ted Honderich describes terrorism as small-scale violence, driven by a

political aim, that violates national or international law and is prima facie morally wrong.

He thereby counts a good deal of resistance activity and guerilla warfare as terrorist, even

when directed against military personnel, while excluding the large-scale military actions

of governments. Of course, he may define the word as he chooses, but given its common

1
currency and negative connotation, terrorism has become the term of art for classifying

illegitimate political violence. Not all small-scale political violence merits this

description and some large-scale violence does. Exempting states from being agents of

terrorism yields an unfair rhetorical advantage to established governments in any political

struggle, especially since the weaponry and organization that states use in pursuing their

ends through violence against civilians consistently dwarfs any amount of harm achieved

by non-state actors.2 The moral concerns with terrorism have to do with nature of its

victims, the methods employed, or the intentions with which it is done, not the identity of

its agents.

I will employ the neutral definition in what follows, though my remarks are

compatible with the definition Honderich offers.

2. Honderich on Justified Terrorism

Attempts to justify terrorism on moral grounds are likely to be met with expressions of

incredulity. It is more common to hear sweeping denunciations of terrorism on the

grounds that it is a brutal violation of the human rights, fails to treat people as moral

persons, or indiscriminately attacks the innocent. Terrorism commonly generates

disgust, hatred, and vengeance, not only within the targeted community, but also among

the external audience with little understanding of the relevant history, rendering it a

dubious strategy that might increase the determination and volume of ones enemies.

Recalling Kants insistence that war can be justified only if it is expected to contribute to

future peace, it is because terrorism is capable of generating intense feelings of hatred

2
and vengeance that it threatens to undermine trust and the possibility of future

coexistence (Kant 1983, 109-110).

Yet, it is not obvious that these considerations trump all others if terrorism is the

only means for securing an overridingly justifiable end, that is, when not committing

terrorism would have morally worse consequences. Can such a scenario ever exist?

Honderich thinks that it can, specifically, whenever terrorism is necessary to achieve an

end justifiable by his Principle of Humanity, namely, that the right thingwhether we

are speaking of an action, practice, institution, government, society or possible world

is the one that according to the best judgement and information is the rational one in the

sense of being effective and not self-defeating with respect to the end of getting and

keeping people out of bad lives. To this he adds the following means-end principle: if

one has a right to X and doing Y is the only means to achieving X, then one has a right to

do Y. In both principles, I interpret him to be speaking of what is overridingly right.

Honderich argues that the right thing in 1947-48 was the establishment of a Jewish

national state in Palestine. However, to secure a Jewish state required a decisive Jewish

majority among the citizens, and at the time this entailed transferring a large segment

of the Palestinian Arab majority to areas outside those claimed for a Jewish state. During

the 1948-49 war, this was achieved through massacre, fear-induced flight, and forced

exodus, resulting in the removal of three-quarters of a million Palestinian Arabs from

their homes and lands.3 Accordingly, by Honderichs logic, since the only means of

establishing a Jewish national state was through terrorism, then the founding of Israel in

Palestine and the terrorism for it was right in what is arguably the most fundamental

sense. The same blessing is to be withheld from what Honderich calls neo-Zionism

3
the endeavor to extend the Jewish state throughout Palestine. However, since the

Palestinians also have a right to a state of their own in the remainder of Palestine, then

they have a right to resist neo-Zionism, and since the only means to do so is through the

use of terrorism against Israelis, then Palestinians have a right to engage in terrorism.

In response to this dramatic reasoning, it is doubtful that the establishment of nation-

states is of overriding importance. By definition, a nation-state is constituted for the sake

of a specific national or cultural group, and inevitably, its institutions, laws, and policies

reflect the culture and interests of that people. Yet, few areas of the world are culturally

homogenous, and since human beings are unlikely to abandon the habit of identifying

with groups to which other collectives are unfavorably compared, the de jure favoring of

one groups cultural values is bound to be feared and opposed by other groups who see it

as a threat to their interests. Nationalismthe doctrine that favors the establishment of

nation-statesis plainly a recipe for restriction, resentment, and retaliation. It has also

given rise to interstate belligerency; not only did it underlie the massive world wars of the

first half of the 20th century, it has continued to threaten stability in the Balkans, central

Africa, and southern Asia in the 21st. To the case at hand, the forcible establishment of a

Jewish state in the Near East has been at the center of Middle East tensions for the past

60 years, and continues to fuel both the American invasion of Islamic territory and

resistance to that invasion.

The establishment of nation-states cannot be justified by appeal to the Principle of

Self-Determination, arguably, a component of international law. Any attempt to

accommodate the worlds 5000 or so national groups through the nationalistic

interpretation of that principle, namely, a state for every nation, would generate

4
inconsistent demands for sovereignty in culturally heterogeneous regions. In today's

world, there is an increasing need for individuals to identify themselves as members of

the global community, to work for the common interest, and to recognize that the world

and its resources belong to all its inhabitants. Too frequently, the demand for national

allegiance is exclusivist, pointing an individual in an opposite direction, threatening the

prospects for global cooperation and the existence of weaker national groups. Viewed in

its proper light, the Principle of Self-Determination derives from the same root as the

doctrine of popular sovereignty, conferring upon the inhabitants of politically-defined

regions the right to be self-governing, regardless of their national, ethnic, or cultural

complexion. The massive violation of this fundamentally democratic principle is the

chief moral failure that has shaped the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.4

If we are serious about keeping people out of bad lives, as Honderich urges, then

there is plenty of reason to resist nationalism, and if terrorism can only be justified

because it is the means for creating nation-states then Honderich's argument fails. But an

argument is one thing; its conclusion is quite another. Despite his reasoning, perhaps a

distinct justification can be given for Palestinian terrorism.

3. Radical Existential Threats and Legitimate Responses

Any community can be subjected to threats and attacks stemming from civil disorder,

government oppression, foreign invasions and occupations. Normally, the job of

defending a community is vested in the sovereign power, but the sovereign might fail to

deliver, especially if it is weak or is itself the aggressor. Just as individuals have a right

of self-defense in the absence of police protection, so too, a community has the right to

5
collective self-defense when state protection is unavailableat least when it is

legitimately constituted within the territory where the aggression occurs.

Nowhere is the justice of collective self-defense more manifest when a community

faces an aggressive threat to its very existence. This can take different forms, with

attempted extermination of its members being the clearest case, but also through

dispersion, enslavement, forced conversions of its members, destruction of its vital

institutions, appropriation of its natural resources, or seizure of its territory. Each of

these threats to a communitys survival is an existential threat and, typically, will be

viewed as unjustifiable by that community insofar as it places value in its own survival.

How is collective self-defense against an existential threat to be pursued?

Presumably, some moral constraints like those propounded in just war theory are

relevant, for no communitystate or non-stateis justified in resorting to violence

unless it has a just cause and employs violence as a last resort, through a competent

authority, with expectations of success, etc. (Valls 2000a). The following are what might

be called the standard measures of self-defense a community may undertake:

(1) offers of direct negotiation with the aggressor to resolve the concerns that have led

to the aggression;

(2) appeals to a recognized sovereign or external powers to forcibly intervene to stop

the aggression;

(3) appeals to international agencies, institutions, and laws in order to arbitrate and

work towards a peaceful resolution;

(4) resort to non-violent resistance to halt or retard the aggression.

If these measures fail, then the community has the right to,

6
 (5) resort to military resistance, whether through conventional or guerrilla warfare,

against the aggressors military forces within jus in bello guidelines.

While this latter measure is usually accorded to organized states, a community not under

state protection has the right to direct its members to take up arms in pursuit of collective

self-defense.

Suppose that the leadership of a community faced with aggression has good reason

to believe that the aggression constitutes an unjustifiable existential threat. Suppose

further that the community has repeatedly resorted to the standard measures for self-

defense, but without success. Then the targeted community faces a radical existential

threat. Such a situation qualifies as a supreme emergency and a paradigmatic just

causenamely, to eliminate or reduce the threatif anything does. Would terrorism

then be a justifiable option?

I think so. Working within the confines of the just war tradition as far as we can, it

should be noted, first of all, that the criterion of just cause is readily satisfied. Moreover,

nothing prohibits satisfaction of the requirement of competent authority, either through

endorsement by the acknowledged leadership of the community or by the community

itself through the best available means of determining consent.5 Similarly, the condition

of right intent is satisfiable insofar as the goal of the contemplated action is to end or

reduce the existential threat. Recourse to terrorism might also satisfy the requirements of

proportionality and last resort given that the aggression is unjustified and that standard

measures of self defense have been tried and have failed. Because of gross disparities in

economic and military resources between the aggressor and the targeted community, and

because of the continual technological improvements in protection of military personnel,

7
terrorism might be the only means of resistance available. It would then be a

Machiavellian course of action, viz., a last resort violation of accepted standards by a

sovereign entity for the sake of an overridingly just goal, namely, to combat an

unwarranted existential threat. Suicide terrorism, in particular, is viewed by its agents as

a strategy of last resort when embroiled with a zero-sum conflict (Pape 2005, 89-94).

If a proposed act or campaign of terrorism is to be justified, however, its proponents

must have evidence that there is a reasonable hope of success that they might enable the

community to reach the goals related to the just cause. This is often the most difficult jus

ad bellum condition to satisfy (Fotion 2004, 49-53), and some, like Michael Walzer

(1988, 240) and Haig Katchadourian (1998, 27), argue that terrorism never works to

advance a groups ultimate goals. But there are counterexamples. For one thing, state

terrorism has frequently achieved desired goals; the American manifest destiny was

partly achieved through terrorism against native Americans, and it has been argued that

the terror bombing of Japanese cities in 1945 hastened the end of WWII. Non-state

terrorism has also been effective (Wilkins 1982, 39; Pape 2005, 61-76), e.g., as Jewish

terrorism in the late 1940s was instrumental in securing a Jewish majority in Israel. In

general terms, it is not too difficult to understand how a threatened communitys resort to

terrorism against an aggressor could be successful in advancing its goal of self-

preservation.

1. The aggressor concludes that the price of its aggression is too high and, to avoid

violence against its own civilian population decides to abandon or suspend its

aggression.6

8
 2. Recourse to terrorism might draw attention to the grievances of the threatened

community. As a result, it might increase its support and external powers might

be caused to intervene to bring an end to the aggression because of larger political

ramifications or general humanitarian concerns.7

3. By retaliating against aggression, the threatened community gains credibility and

recognition, both from external parties and from other members of their own

community who might thereby become more confident, more hopeful, and more

committed to joining a resistance whose likelihood of success is increased with

greater participation and unity (see Fanon 1963, 38 and Pape 2005, chapter 6.).

Two further conditions enhance the case for terrorism. First, the probability of

success is increased if the aggressor has itself used terrorism against the community

under threat. Such parity of means in the method of violence might strengthen the

conviction in external observers, as well as in the aggressors own population, that it is

appropriate to return terrorism for terrorism or that tit for tat violence has escalated out of

proportion. An asymmetrical use of terrorism, by contrast, runs the risk of evoking

contempt for the threatened community among external parties and in alienating

members of the threatened community who would normally be opposed to such tactics.

Second, barring a pure utilitarian consequentialism, concern for a just distribution of

the value of the expected consequences must also be factored in, and this engenders a

direct challenge to any attempt at justifying terrorism. If one party is innocent of an

aggression against another, then the latters violence against the former in pursuit of

redress would be a gross violation of justice (Primoratz 2004a, 20-21). So, how could

violence against civilians be justified if they innocent of the terrorists grievances?

9
Answer? It is incorrect to suppose that civilians are automatically innocent of their

communitys aggression against another community (Holmes 1989, 187). Civilians

might support their governments through overt political action, e.g., political rallies in

favor of the aggression, disseminating information and propaganda in favor of

aggression, working within political organizations to generate or sustain the aggression,

or, more simply, by paying taxes. Moreover, if the aggressor has a representative

political system that operates under the principle of popular sovereignty, then citizens

share responsibility for the laws, policies, and actions of the state insofar as these

represent collective consent. Citizenship in a representative system is voluntary; it can be

renounced, even if there are dramatic consequences for so doing, e.g., imprisonment or

exile. Those who voluntarily join any association or institution share in responsibility for

its actions, and this responsibility is not avoided by belonging to the political opposition

or having been critical of the governments policies and acts, even though, in such cases,

ones culpability might be of a lesser degree. In sum, terrorism is justified only if a

further culpability condition is satisfied, namely, that civilians within the aggressor

community share in the responsibility for that aggression.8

This departure from the jus in bello rules is less dramatic than might appear, for there

is no reason why the demand of proportionality, the prohibition on illegitimate means,

(e.g., rape, nuclear weapons, nerve gas, etc.), and the requirement of humane treatment of

captives, cannot be satisfied. Finally, while the principle of noncombatant immunity is

abandoned in the case of a radical existential threat, a variant remains: in redressing a

grievance, those innocent of that grievance are not to be targeted. In other words, there is

no reason why terrorism cannot discriminate, targeting only those members of the

10
aggressor community who are guilty of that aggression (Valls 2000a, 76). The truly non-

culpable, e.g., children, the mentally ill, and so forth, should be immune from attack.

Let me now bring this to a head. I have argued that where various conditions are

met, then terrorism against an aggressor can be justified. More precisely, if the members

of a community have adequate evidence that

their community is subjected to an unjustifiable radical existential threat from an

identifiable aggressor (hence, that the jus ad bellum conditions of just cause and

last resort are met);

a projected campaign of terrorism would satisfy the jus ad bellum conditions of

competent authority, proportionality, right intent, and reasonable hope of success;

the aggressor is using terrorism against their community (the parity of means

condition);

the adult civilians of the aggressor are culpable of the aggression that constitutes

the existential threat (the culpability condition); and

the jus in bello demands of proportionality, legitimate means, humane treatment

of captives, and discrimination (do not target innocents) are to be respected;

then their recourse to terrorism against the aggressor community for the purposes of

ending or reducing that threat is morally justifiable.

4. Palestinian Terrorism

Using the argument from radical self-defense, there is a prima facie case for the

legitimacy of both past and current Palestinian terrorism directed against Israelis. First,

there should be little doubt that Zionism poses an existential threat to Palestinian

11
communities throughout Palestine. The threat, perceived by Palestinian leaders since the

early 20th century, has been demonstrated in many ways:

Israels expulsion of Palestinians in 1948 and 1967 and the refusal to repatriate

Palestinian refugees.

Israels colonization, land confiscation, and the imposition of economic and other

forms of structural constraints upon Palestinians in the occupied territories from

1967 until the present.

Israels systematic violation of the human rights Palestinians in the occupied

territories in the form of assaults upon Palestinian towns, villages, and refugee

camps with tanks, aircraft and artillery, assassination squads, torture, collective

punishment, detention without charge, and deportations.

Israels refusal to comply with international resolutions regarding settlements,

occupations policies, and withdrawal from the territories occupied in the 1967

war.

Israels opposition to peace initiatives, e.g., repeated calls for an international

peace conference on the Middle East, the Rogers Plan of 1969-70, the Reagan

Plan of 1982, Prince Fahds peace plan of 1981-1982, the PLOs offer of peace in

1988, and the Arab Leagues proposals of 2002.

Israels assassinations of Palestinian political leaders, extending from the 1970s to

the present.

The expressed intention by the dominant Israeli political parties to retain control

of the West Bank or large segments thereof, as demonstrated by the Labor Partys

early support of the Allon Plan and its subsequent expansion of the settlement

12
 network during the 1990s, the Likuds election platform vows to retain all of the

West Bank and its rapid acceleration of settlement building when in power, and

the publication of official Israeli maps showing the West Bank as part of Israel

(Reinhart 2002, chp. ix).

Israels refusal to permit establishment of a viable Palestinian state in the

occupied territories, as revealed by Moshe Sharetts agreements with Abdullah

(Rogan 2001), the consolidation of its control over the West Bank during the Oslo

period, Ehud Baraks breaking off talks at Taba in Jan. 2001 (Reinhart 2002, chp.

II), and Ariel Sharons rejection of the Arab Leagues peace overtures in spring

2002, the 2002 Geneva Accords between moderate Israelis and Palestinians, and

the Bush Administrations 2002 Road Map for peace.

The virtually unquestioned support for Israeli military and political policies by the

United States.

This existential threat is unjustifiable because of its violation of the human and political

rights of Palestinians, including the right of self-determination (Halwani and Kapitan

2007, chp. 1). In light of it, Palestinians have a just cause for employing standard

measures of self-defense in their quest for their survival as a community in their home

territory.

Second, the Palestinians have attempted the standard measures of self-defense in

combating the existential threat posed by Zionism.

As early as 1913, Palestinian leaders sought accommodation with the Zionists (Hirst

2003, 154). The major Palestinian political organization, the PLO, has tried

diplomacy by entering into direct negotiations with representatives of the Israeli

13
 government and various Israeli groups and individuals (Shehadeh 1997), and in 1988

the Palestine National Council ratified the two state solution, thereby explicitly

recognizing Israels right to exist. The Palestinian Authority under Arafat and Abbas

had repeatedly stressed its acceptance of the two state solution.

The Palestinians have also appealed to external agencies for assistance (for example,

the League of Nations, the United Nations, the Arab League) and to external powers,

they have supported international resolutions calling for a two-state solution to the

conflict (see the record summarized in Finkelstein 2005, 294-300), and in April 2003

they endorsed the Bush Administrations Road Map.

The Palestinians have repeatedly used techniques of non-violence in combating the

Israeli occupation (Holmes 1995, Saleh 2003, Abunimah 2006, 49-51), and have

sought and received the help of like-minded Israelis, but to no avail.

The Palestinians have resisted established militaries, viz., the British military in

1936-39, the Zionist forces in 1947-48, and the Israeli military since the

establishment of the Jewish state.

None of these measures have been successful in ending or abating the existential threat

they face, much less in securing their self-determination. In the atmosphere of ongoing

hostilities accompanying the American occupation of the Middle East, there is even less

likelihood that these standard measures of self-defense will be successful. By

emasculating Palestinian diplomacy, intensifying the control over the West Bank, Israel

has deprived young Palestinians of hope, leaving terrorism one of the few avenues of

active resistance left. Thus, there is good reason to conclude that the Palestinian in the

14
West Bank face a radical existential threat, in which case terrorism presents itself as a last

resort strategy for that community.9

Third, recourse to terrorism has produced at least some desired results for the

Palestinians, even though it has not yet secured Palestinian self-determination nor ended

the existential threat posed by Israel. For one thing, it has alleviated the Palestinians

sense of impotence against a powerful adversary and, thereby, strengthened the

confidence, resolve and unity among Palestinian communities. For another, it has

succeeded in keeping attention riveted upon the conflict and, thus, upon Palestinian

grievances. For over eighty years, beginning with the British commissions of the 1920s,

extreme violence has caused external players to play a more active role in resolving the

Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and perhaps no other contemporary political conflict has been

subject to as much scrutiny and attempted amelioration. It has led some Israelis to

question policies of the Israeli government in the occupied territories, and, in a few

instances, it has caused the Israeli government to make some concessions to the

Palestinians (Pape 2005, chapter 5).

Fourth, the remaining conditions for justifying the Palestinians campaign of

terrorism are satisfied. Palestinian militancy has received enough popular support from

the Palestinian residents of the territories to sanction at least the general strategy of

violence against Israeli civilians, a support that intensifies whenever the Israeli military

increases the amount of terrorism it employs against the Palestinians. Not only is the

parity of means condition thereby satisfied, but since Israel is a representative democracy

with large percentages of its adult citizens publicly supporting the measures that

constitute the existential threat to the Palestinians, the culpability condition is also met.

15
The Israeli electorate has placed in power men with a record of violence against

Palestinians civilians, including Menachem Begin, Yitzhak Shamir, Yitzhak Rabin, and

Ariel Sharon. This electorate has not been blind to the pasts and polices of these men,

and this is concrete evidence that it supported terrorism against Palestinians (Finkelstein

2005, 300-301, Schememann 2002). In 2004, despite the deaths of over 3000

Palestinians since September 2000, they returned the Likud party to power, doubling its

number of seats in the Knesset. According to a March 2002 poll published in Haaretz on

12 March 2002, 46 percent of Israelis favored expulsion of Palestinians from the

occupied territories and 60 percent favored encouraging Palestinian citizens of Israel to

leave. In a 2005 poll, 65% of Israelis expressed opposition to a full Israeli withdrawal to

the 1949 armistice lines or abandoning the neighborhoods that surround East

Jerusalemthe very settlements that have destroyed the contiguity of the West Bank

and cut Palestinians off from Jerusalem and each other(Abunimah 2006, 52).

While these facts do not justify every act of terrorism committed by Palestinians,

they constitute a strong prima facie case that the Palestinian terrorism has been justified

in some instances. Not all Palestinians agree. Since recourse to terrorism has also

damaged the Palestinians reputation and provided the Israeli government with a pretext

to tighten its control over the West Bank, to impose further restrictions upon its residents,

and to intensify its own violence, many thoughtful Palestinians have condemned such

actions considering that pushing the area towards an existential war between the two

people living on the holy land will lead to destruction for the whole region(Urgent

Appeal to Stop Suicide Bombings, Al Quds 20 June 2002).

16
 Yet, despite this reasoned appeal, the undeniable fact is that the Israeli political

leadership remains determined to expand the Jewish state beyond the 1949 armistice

lines, with or without Palestinian resistance. The Israeli settlements are integral to this

expansion, for not only are they portrayed as irreversible facts on the ground, they are

instrumental to the argument that the only way to end hostilities is by separating the two

communities by either transferring the Palestinians out of the area or isolating them

within increasingly infeasible disconnected bantustans (Reinhart 2003. chps V, IX). It

is ludicrous to think that these settlements in occupied territory are driven by a desire for

security; if anything, they multiply Israels security concerns. Not only must the Israeli

government continue to expend large amounts of money in protecting their inhabitants,

but Palestinian outrage and frustration will only intensify with every dunum confiscated

and every Israeli house built. Unless there is a collective decision on the part of

Palestinians to concede defeat and evacuate their ancestral homeland, these emotions will

seek outlets. Recourse to terrorism is one way of checking the Zionist ambitions which

otherwise would very likely proceed unopposed and beneath the radar of world opinion

and concern.

If their recourse to violence is likely not to be successful in ending the existential

threat Palestinians face, can their terrorism be justified by any other argument? That is a

complex matter that I have addressed elsewhere (Halwani and Kapitan 2007, chp. 3).

But, at this juncture, reasoning often fades before reality. If we remember that young

Palestinians in the territories have lived their entire lives under military occupation that

has featured routine brutality, dispossession, and humiliation, we should not be surprised

if they feel impelled to react with terrorist acts in which they fail to see their victims as

17
innocent. That large numbers from any society should be so consumed by humiliation,

outrage, despair, and vengeance that they repeatedly find violence as the only outlet, is a

vivid testimony to the political failure of international diplomacy and the moral failure of

the world community.

18
Notes

1. Similar definitions can be found in several sources, e.g., Garnor 2001 and Coady

2004, 5.

2. See Glover 1991, 257, 273; Gordon and Lopez 2000, 110-111; and Jaggar 2005, 208.

That states can commit criminal acts of warfare has long been recognized, as shown by

the emergence of international agreements like the Hague Conventions, the Geneva

Conventions, and numerous UN resolutions.

3. See the documentation of this Zionist campaign of ethnic cleansing in Khalidi 1971,

Flapan 1987, Morris 1987, 1999, 2001, and Pappe 2006. In his diaries, Theodore Herzl

advocated discrete expropriation of Arab property and removal of the poor Arabs from

the land (Patai 1960, vol. I, p. 88). Subsequent Zionist leaders such as David Ben-Gurion

and Vladimir Jabotinsky explicitly favored forced transfer of the Arabs from Palestine to

make way for the establishment of a Jewish state (Flapan 1987, 103; Gorny 1987, 270;

Morris 1999, 659, and 2001, 42-44; Segev 1999, 407).

4. I have argued against the nationalist interpretation of the principle of self-

determination in Kapitan 2006 and in Halwani and Kapitan 2007. See, also, some of the

critiques of nationalism in Acton 1967, Parekh, 1999, Petrovic 1994, and Dahbour 2003.

5. Andrew Valls writes: if an organization claims to act on behalf of a people and is

widely seen by that people as legitimately doing so, then the rest of us should look on that

organization as the legitimate authority of the people for the purpose of assessing its

entitlement to engage in violence on their behalf (Valls 2000a, 71). Virginia Held

(2005, 185-188) points out that while democratic authorization of a leadership is not

19
always possible when democratic mechanisms are inhibited, this does not preclude the

requirement of legitimate authority from being satisfied for acts of terrorism by non-state

groups.

6. Pape 2005, chapter 5, claims that groups such as Hamas, Islamic Jihad, Hezbollah,

and the Tamil Tigers, began with more conventional guerrilla operations but after these

operations proved ineffective, they resorted to suicide attacks which proved successful in

coercing governments to negotiate.

7. The motivation of intervening parties can vary. Some might see intervention as a

means of either harming or defeating the aggressor or as an opportunity to extend

influence over the threatened community. Others might be caused to act because to

prevent violence between the two communities from escalating. Such intervention has

repeatedly taken place since WWII, especially in Africa. The intervention by Western

powers in the Balkans in the 1990s was partly caused by a desire to halt the continued

aggression and atrocities in Bosnia and Kosovo.

8. Similar reasoning can be found in Wilkins (1992, 21-22). See also, Virginia Held who

writes that If a governments policies are unjustifiable and if political violence to resist

them is justifiable (these are very large ifs, but not at all unimaginable), then it is not

clear why the political violence should not be directed at those responsible for these

policies (Held 2004, 65). Note that the consent one gives through membership in a

voluntary association is a general intention to abide by, and accept responsibilities for,

that associations policies and acts, whatever these might be.

9. The Hamas leader, Dr. Abd al-Aziz Rantisi, assassinated by Israel in April 2004,

stated that suicide bombings against Israel are the weapons of last resort because Israel

20
is offering us two choices, either to die a meek lamb's death at the slaughter house or as

martyr-bombers. www.infoimagination.org/islamnm/second_intifada.html, accessed on

July 14, 2006

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