ABSTRACT
Religious violence, including terrorism, was common before the nineteenth century. Religious justifications for terrorism are both ancient and contemporary. Terrorism can also involve groups that are part of the dominant or majority religion in a country. Interestingly enough, the radicalization process by which Jewish individuals have been recruited into terrorist groups is quite similar to the processes by which Muslims have been attracted. Jewish groups in the British mandated territory of Palestine utilized terrorism in their independence struggle, but this struggle was much more of an effort at state creation than religious terrorism. Hizballah has been considered one of the most active terrorist organizations in the world. Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda network became very prominent actors in the international terrorist scene in the late twentieth century. Suicide terrorism has proven to “be one of the most efficient and least expensive tactics ever to be employed by terror and guerrilla groups”.
