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Transnational Terrorism vs ‘Local’ Terrorism By Oleg Nekrassovski
A comparison, along several categories, between transnational terrorism, exemplified by Al-Qaeda, and presumably more local terrorist organizations, such as Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Taliban, shows that there are no clear differences between the two types of organizations. It seems to be a popular belief that Al-Qaeda’s concerns are inherently global, and that it wants to create a single, theocratic one-world Islamic government (Worldwide Caliphate). But this appears to be a delusion as according to Atwan (2006, p.222), Al-Qaeda’s long-term military strategy aims to bring about the collapse of the US by involving it into many military conflicts, which it would be unable to sustain. This would then make it easy to overthrow the hated Arab regimes and re-establish the caliphate across the Muslim lands. Moreover, when it comes to the allies of the US, Al-Qaeda’s aim seems to be limited to that of driving them out of Muslim lands rather than attempting to make them collapse. For example, the bombings in Madrid led to the withdrawal of Spanish troops from Iraq; after which bin Laden offered truce to the Spanish people. Finally, bin Laden’s address to the American public, before the country’s elections, implied that truce may be possible, depending on what they will decide their government should do (Atwan, 2006, p. 223). All of this suggests that Al-Qaeda’s plan is to, one way or another, drive out all foreign influence out of the Muslim lands, so as to unable Al-Qaeda and its supporters to rebuild the societies of Muslim lands in line with their ideology. Thus, Al-Qaeda’s concerns are limited to Muslim lands, and are local rather than global; in which respect they are essentially the same as those of Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Taliban. Hezbollah’s ambitions seem to be limited to Lebanon and Israel. It aims to expel all foreign influences and forces from Lebanon, especially the Israelis, the Americans, and the French. It wants to bring the Lebanese Phalanges Party to justice, and to destroy Israel, which it sees as a perpetual threat (Hezbollah, 1985). Hamas “sees itself as a local “resistance” organization and has traditionally limited its operations to targeting Israelis in Israel, the West Bank, and the Gaza Strip” (Levitt, 2007). The goals of Hamas can be separated into long-term and short-term goals. Its long-term goal is nothing less than the complete destruction of Israel, mainly through violence, and the subsequent establishment of a Palestinian Islamic state on Israel’s former territory (Gruber, 2007).
Its short-term goals are more pragmatic, including ensuring its political and military position in Gaza and
the West Bank, maintaining its strong domestic support by ameliorating daily living conditions through
improvements in the economy, infrastructure, and governance, as well as strengthening its international
position (Gruber, 2007).
The Taliban were no less local in their ambitions, as they spent their careers capturing Afghanistan bit by bit, and openly declared their desire to become sole rulers of the whole country (Rashid, 2000, p. 95).
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According to Atwan (2006, p. 234), the key difference between Al-Qaeda and all other terrorist organizations, is that Al-Qaeda “has no geographical location; its membership is distributed across the globe and cyberspace and has no obvious identifying features.” This characteristic, however, at least in part, is clearly not unique to Al-Qaeda. For example, “According to FBI officials, some 50–100 Hamas and Hezbollah members with military training are present in the United States. … The CIA report tracked Hamas activity not only in the Balkans but in the Philippines as well.” (Levitt, 2007). Aside from engaging in fund-raising and low-level intelligence gathering, “Hamas supporters abroad have also played distinctly operational roles in Hamas terrorist attacks.” Specific examples of such proactive supporters include residents of Britain and Spain (Levitt, 2007). It can also be argued that only “transnational” terrorist organizations, such as Al-Qaeda, engage in attacks on targets located many thousands of miles away from their geographic area of concern. This, however, also appears to be incorrect. “On 1 November 2003, Israeli authorities arrested Akal as he was leaving Gaza en route back to Canada.” Akal was a Canadian citizen who originally emigrated from Gaza to Canada a few years previously “and returned to Gaza in October 2003, ostensibly to find a Palestinian bride” (Levitt, 2007).
According to Israeli authorities, Akal admitted that during his month in Gaza he was trained in explosives
production and taught to use an M-16 by a Hamas operative named Ahmed Wahabe. Wahabe allegedly
tasked Akal to return home and “gather information (via the media) on a senior Israeli official who was
arriving in the U.S. Wahabe instructed Akal to then monitor the senior Israeli official’s movements and
attempt to assassinate her in a sniper attack. Wahabe also asked Akal to attack members of the U.S. and
Canadian Jewish communities, either by shooting or by bombing their homes and/or cars.” (Levitt, 2007)
According to Atwan (2006, p. 233), “What makes al Qaeda different to other Islamist organizations such as the Muslim Brotherhood is the flexibility of its ideology.” “While the leadership’s own theological platform is essentially Salafi,” Al-Qaeda’s members and supporters include people of nearly all Islamic sects, except Shi‘ism – the only Islamic sect to which Al-Qaeda is opposed (Atwan, 2006, p. 233). Whatever may be the case with the Muslim Brotherhood (which also used to engage in terrorist acts), members and supporters of organizations like Hamas, Hezbollah, and the Taliban seem to be no less diverse in terms of the ideologies that they follow. It is by no means clear whether Hezbollah’s membership is limited to those who hold Shi’a fundamentalist Islamic ideology – the official ideology of the whole organization. More importantly, however, one of Hezbollah’s main supporters is Syria’s secular regime (Hezbollah, 1985). And when it comes to the Taliban, their members and supporters were clearly even more ideologically diverse than those of Al-Qaeda. In fact, the supposedly highly diverse Al-Qaeda was itself one of the many supporters of the Taliban. “The Taliban also [used to] host Islamic extremist groups from Russia, Pakistan, China, Burma, Iran, central Asia, and several countries of the Far East, which all [used to] fight for the Taliban while quietly carrying out their political agendas at home.” The Taliban supporters also included the Afghan transport mafia as well as the countries of Saudi Arabia and Pakistan (Rashid, 2000).
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References
Atwan, A. B. (2006). The Secret History of Al Qaeda. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Gruber, S. (2007). Hamas: Pragmatic Ideology. Al Nakhlah. Available at
http://ui04e.moit.tufts.edu/al_nakhlah/archives/spring2007/shai-2.pdf.
Hezbollah. (1985). The Hezbollah Program: An Open Letter. In Rabinovich, I., & Reinharz, J.,
(Eds.) (2008). Israel in the Middle East: Documents and Readings on Society, Politics, and
Foreign Relations, Pre-1948 to the Present (pp. 423- 428). Lebanon, NH: University Press of New
England.
Levitt, M. (2007). Could Hamas Target the West? Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 30: 925–945.
Rashid, A. (2000). Taliban: militant Islam, oil and fundamentalism in Central Asia. New Haven:
Yale University Press.
