“…If anyone kills a person – unless it is for murder
or for spreading mischief in the land – it would be as
if he killed all people. And if anyone saves a life,
it would be as if he saved the life
of all people” (Qur’an 5:32).
The world we live in is full of good and evil, and very often, people can not define what is good and what is not. Should we murder people who had done the same before? Should we be the same? How can we punish them?
In my opinion, the aim to punish is not the most important in this, but we should try to avoid the same crimes in the future, and that is the aim of Mankind.
Of course, nowadays, many people associate terrorists with Muslims. In some way, there is a reason for this because the most laud terroristic events helped with the help of Muslims. But we should remember that every criminal has no nationality, gender, and age.
It is very difficult to speak about punishment for people who are not afraid of anything. Fanatic beliefs make them blind, and they seem not to feel pain, and they do not have fear. Is it really so? Do we have the weapons against the terrorist? Speaking about this, I mean the weapons of moral character. It is very hard to kill a person in order to punish them when they want to be killed for being happy. So, there is a question if we should give such a generous gift to a person who killed or even tried to kill innocent people?
Of course, there is one kind of weapon – religion. Muslims will never stand if they are made to violate the laws of Islam. But then there is a question – we are people who live in the civilized world, and how can we insult religion? We are humans, and we should understand and recognize all the forms of religion, nationalities, and languages.
In my opinion, to define the ways of punishment, we should research the inner mechanisms of the terrorist apparatus.
Terrorism in all its forms has become one of the dangerous things nowadays, according to its unpredictability and the effects on socio-political and moral problems of the XXI century. Terrorism and extremism in all their manifestations are increasingly threatening for the security of many countries and their citizens, entail enormous political, economic, and moral losses, have a strong psychological pressure on large numbers of people (Bedau, 2005).
Terrorism has already acquired an international, global character. Even relatively recently, it was possible to speak about terrorism as about local phenomenon. In the 80-90-ies it has become a universal phenomenon. Globalization and the increasing internationalization of terrorism – it is an indisputable fact that is now facing humanity. This phenomenon is due to the expansion and globalization of international relations and cooperation in various fields.
It is interesting that today the main material support to terrorist organizations comes from Arab oil-producing and developed Western nations. On the territory of developed countries, there are many religious and ethnic communities whose dissatisfaction with their situation is alien to their socio-cultural atmosphere also transform into the various forms of support to their “brothers” in other countries around the world. Thus the financial base for international terrorism is formed.
The concern of the international community with the growth of terrorist activity is determined by the great number of victims of terrorists and huge material damage, and that, thanks to the development of advanced technologies with dual-media and global computer networks (the Internet), extreme commercialization in the sphere of so-called mass culture, where there is a cultivation of violence and brutality, more people can get and then use the information how to create the most sophisticated means of destruction and the means of their application (Elsner, 2008).
Only recently, human and material losses in connection with terrorist acts were recorded in the USA, Russia, Pakistan, Algeria, Israel, Egypt, Turkey, Albania, Iran, and in several other countries. The international nature of human life, new communications, and information, new types of weapons dramatically reduce the significance of state borders and other means of protection against terrorism. The diversity of terrorist activity is increasing and is increasingly linked with national, religious, ethnic conflicts, separatist and liberation movements (Simonsen, 2006).
Terrorist activities in the current situation are characterized by a broad scope, the lack of explicit state borders, the existence of communication and interaction with international terrorist centers and organizations; rigid organizational structure, consisting of leadership and operational management, intelligence and counterintelligence units, logistics, military groups, and cover; tight secrecy and careful selection of personnel, availability of agents in law enforcement and government agencies; good technical equipment, competing, if not superior equipment units of government troops, the existence of a vast network of secret shelters, training bases, and ranges. It is significant that getting into their own hand’s modern means of information war, international terrorism imposed on the peoples of their ideas and their assessment of the situation, widespread and success decides mobilization targets to attract young people into their ranks, not to mention the professional mercenaries.
Terrorist organizations have established a close relationship on the ideology-confessional, military, commercial, and other basis. Terrorist groups, particularly their leaders, often work closely on matters of arms purchases, cover each other, the division of roles and tasks in their scale of operations (such as in Afghanistan or Lebanon). It may be noted that the international community has learned to maneuver the terrorist forces and the means to move large numbers of channels for illegal weapons and militants (Elsner, 2008).
An important feature of modern terrorism is that it is well-structured and organized. Terrorist organizations pose unified governing bodies, management, planning unit.
Generally, the question of why the world of Islam today is an important generator of ideas of terror as a tool and an instrument of political struggle and a strong base of terrorism is still not researched completely. It is a separate important topic for in-depth study and subsequent use of that study, in the interest of finding a basis of understanding with the world of Islam, and curb of terrorism, as well as interest and a majority of Muslim countries, also bearing big moral, political and material losses from this infection of humanity.
Many of the causes and driving forces of this phenomenon have been obvious for a long time. The modern global human situation of our planet is exacerbated by the growth in the world socio-economic and inter-civilizational controversy, the confrontation between the developed North, and lagging behind in the development of the South (Simonsen, 2006). These contradictions and this opposition are unable to soften, even more so – fully remove, and they may achieve a balance between scientific and technological revolution, nor the processes of globalization of the economy or global advocacy. Even if the countries of the “golden billion” are trying to impose their views on the rest of the world community and are forced to follow their example, the effect is often produced as the opposite of desire. There is still disengagement, the growth of the gap between rich and poor countries, segments of the population, nations. It is possible to observe the marginalization of the world, and the inevitable answer to all this is a marginal strengthening of extremism and international terrorism, combating with “wrong.” Incidentally, these processes occur on the territory of the «golden billion,» in the so-called cradle of Western democracy, in the house that teaches others how to live! Often it is in Western countries (the USA, Britain, France, Germany, and others) which are sometimes the most radical in terms of their ideology, global vision, and capabilities of extremist and terrorist organizations and groups, including Muslims.
Terrorist acts committed in recent decades, growing quantitatively and becoming more widespread and dramatic. If in the early ’70s, the target of terrorists was mainly property; in the ’80s., according to U.S. government statistics, half of all terrorist acts were aimed against the people. The goals of terrorists are continuing to expand and vary depending on several circumstances, including the strength and effectiveness of response and safety measures. Modern terrorism has all the signs of organized crime. This allows putting forward a proposal for recognition of the terrorist criminal organizations with all its attendant legal consequences for the organizations themselves and their members. Taking into account the existing criminal law and international practice, it is advisable to apply to the terrorists the rules on liability of accomplices which were used against Nazi war criminals. This means that every terrorist organization or group should be responsible for all the criminal activities of the organization. If the actions of terrorists did not go beyond their own country, the responsibility is on the provisions of national law. In cases of terrorism, the issues concerning the mastermind, organizers should be taken into account, and also the creation of a terrorist organization, which may be particularly important to coordinate the fight against terrorism at the international level in terms of the possible use of political, economic and diplomatic sanctions against the state that condones terrorism (Filger, 2005).
In terms of subjective characteristics of terrorism, it is considered to be always an intentional crime committed with direct intent. A terrorist intent differs from the intent to kill. In the case of murder, there are two parties – the offender and victim; there is a third party in the act of terrorism – the authorities or the public, which appeals to a terrorist organization or terrorist. Terrorists may not be interested in victims; it is not a goal but a means. Their actions are aimed at achieving their objectives (political, selfish, etc.) through the initiation of public attention, intimidating the population and the authorities, promoting their political, religious, or other beliefs. It is apparent indifference to victims, which leads to extreme cruelty, massive nature of the innocent victims, accidental deaths of people (Simonsen, 2006).
They were speaking about the motives of terrorism. It should be mentioned that it is not just about violence, money, revenge, etc. Now, terrorism is largely turned into a political phenomenon, and the reasons for committing the terrorist acts also are largely political or combined. Of course, among the terrorists, there are criminals whose political demands are only the blind, and they are weapons in the hands of politicians, religious extremist organizations, etc. In some cases, to reduce the responsibility of the terrorists and withdraw from the category of international crime, political terrorism is turning into a normal political crime.
There is an example of how the Muslim way of life, including polygamy, supports terrorism in the case of a Palestinian father of the family, which has a dozen of children; several of them are adults. The family lived poor: no work, the life is poor, but it is impossible to find the match at least for one son because there is no money for the bride price. Accordingly, there will be no grandchildren and no respect from the neighbors. Suddenly, one son was persuaded to become a terrorist – a suicide bomber. He acquired the skills in training camp and was killed during a terrorist attack. What does the father feel? Of course, he is sorry about the son, but there are some advantages:
- the son immediately goes to heaven;
- the father immediately becomes a respected man – a father of Shahid;
- the father gets a lot of money; he can find a match for another son, or even two, he will have grandchildren.
Therefore, he endorses the feat of his son and announces it to the media. Moreover, often parents – Muslims are raising their children, teaching them the desire to become terrorists – suicide bombers (Brewer, 2005).
Thus, Islam is not a totalitarian religion, which should outlaw and eradicate (otherwise, it would not be able to last for more than 1300 years), contains certain features of a totalitarian religion, dangerous both for its own and for other people.
And in the fight against terrorism, it is highly desirable to upgrade the way of life of Muslims to conform to the peaceful life and modern standards of civilized countries.
To understand the cruelty of Muslim terrorists, we should analyze the conflict of civilizations, which, in fact, can be the answer to the question of terrorism. I think that researching the roots of the conflicts of civilization will help to find the best punishment for Muslim terrorists, to define their fears and values.
The conflict of civilizations is a real danger. So, there are the preconditions for a conflict of civilizations. Moreover, it can be argued that the opposition of Muslims and civilized nations of America and Europe, including Russia, and Israel has already begun, and the primary means of Muslim expansion today is terrorism, including terrorism suicide bombers. These weapons are now worked out in Israel with moral and financial support from Muslim countries and the acquiescence of the Great Powers, and this method of warfare can always be applied anywhere in the world (Simonsen, 2006).
The war of civilizations is not yet understood; many believe it is multiple local conflicts affecting other countries and hope that their country will not be touched by war. Moreover, time is not on the side of civilized countries, but at the terrorists’, and until the terrorists have weapons of mass destruction is a matter of a few years. And victory is needed before this happens.
To do this, people need to understand the situation, and it is that civilized countries have so far overwhelming superiority in technology, and terrorists have mastered techniques of terror that are much more efficient than the techniques of counterterrorism of civilized countries. They have sufficient funding, they provide rich Muslim countries in accordance with the dogmas of their religion, the rapidly increasing number of potential terrorists, suicide bombers, and dream to die for the cause of Allah, are free to educate and train Muslim ideology. With regard to means of terror, terrorists have successfully used tools made in the civilized world (Brewer, 2005).
On the contrary, civilized countries, which have not yet been major terrorist attacks, did not realize the seriousness of the problem and did not use their potential to win this war, do not understand how dangerous delay is.
But there is still a solution to this problem and the ways of overcoming the conflict of civilizations.
First and foremost, we should understand that to use against the terrorists their weapons is not productive. The destruction of terrorists and their leaders meets the understandable feeling of revenge for the killing of the citizens, but can not be the only or even the main means of combating the terror, as performers and the leaders of the terrorist attacks are appearing with sufficient speed for continuing the terror. Much more important to destroy the entire infrastructure of terror that includes moral, financial, and material support to terror. To destroy the infrastructure of terror, there should be actions that would make the terrorist activities unprofitable and even dangerous, including support of terror (Morse, 2003).
But still, here is a question if it is possible to separate Islam from terrorism, but in reality, everything is much more difficult.
There is a fundamental question: whether Islam can find the justification for terrorism? The answer depends on who and what to take for the interpretation of the tenets of faith. The fact is that for centuries the Islamic political and legal thought has accumulated a huge range of seemingly contradictory ideas and perceptions of direct relevance to modern terrorism: the foundations of power and law, the relationship of States, and the individual’s status of ‘wrong,’ permissible methods of political struggle (Connors, 2007).
The mixed approach of Islam to these issues illustrates his remarkable feature – plurality opinion that is especially true for politics, because the basic provisions are to regulate it, have been formulated on the basis of ijtihad (independent decision – Arabic). Under ijtihad, Islamic thought understands rational search for solutions on matters not clearly settled in the Koran and preaching of Prophet Muhammad. To this, it must be added that few of these sources of rules of war or of ‘wrong’ exist in the early period of Islam, its acute political rivalry, and ideological opponents. Some of them, out-of-the historical context, nowadays often used to justify political extremism.
However, a notable place in the heritage of Islam there is the ideas opposite to specified rules. Hence the thesis of radical Islam must be supplemented by an indication of the inherent religious moderation, tolerance, and capacity for positive interaction with other cultures (Hoffman, 2006).
So the thesis “Islam against terrorism” is acceptably rephrased as “Islam against Islam.” And this is not a game of words, a figurative expression of the problem. After all, just a wave away from Islamic extremism reasoning leaders, calling them non-Muslims – Islam means surrender to terrorists.
So, in my opinion, the main and the most important thing while fighting against terrorists is to choose the right punishment for people who were engaged in terrible crimes. Which choosing the appropriate punishment, we should not forget about the values we have, about the respect to religious views of every person. Everything should be based on humanity. But of course, we should support the most important aim – to avoid terroristic attacks in the future and to save people from death and injuries. Innocent people should not suffer.
To my mind, the best punishment for Muslim terrorists is imprisonment for life. It will allow learning information about the organizations and structures of the terrorist world. In addition, such people can be researched by a psychologist in order to define the mechanisms of their psychology.
Of course, everybody is appalling with the actions of Islamic terrorists, but nobody is talking much about the similarity of action of civilized nations against other nations. Over the past few years, we have seen a lot of what success can be attributed to the level of legalized terrorism. In both cases, killed people, only blame for their loss and anger is always turned on the amorphous substance of “terrorism,” visible personalities remain in “white dress.” If order everything, it must be done fairly and universally, a bad example is contagious, and it brings real visible results.
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