Articles

Suicide Bombers: A New Front Opens in Iraq

The suicide bomber phenomenon had a faster genesis in American-occupied Iraq, in comparison to the Palestinians who adopted this tactic in the mid-1990s after several decades of Israeli occupation. Iraq has been a secular Arab entity, but the danger lies, as in the Palestinian case, that a religious coloration can be given to suicide bombing, especially since all the suicide bombers in Iraq, according to available evidence, have been Muslims. In addition, there is the suspected involvement of foreign Islamic organizations. The fact that no names or records are available of the suicide bombers in several instances, notably the two attacks on UN buildings, and the killing of a prominent Shiite cleric in Najaf, points to the possibility of these attacks being carried out by non-Iraqis. It may also be true that the motivations of the majority of foreign volunteers stems from religion - the Palestinian Islamic Jihad, for instance, has claimed that it has sent its members to Iraq.

The Iraqi soldier, who blew himself up on 29 March in the first suicide bombing, killing four American soldiers, was a Shiite - a community that has frequently resorted to such tactics in modern Islamic history - but there is no evidence of religious incitement in his case. Two women, suspected to be involved in a bombing, a few days later, were believed to have a religious motivation.

A religious explanation of suicide bombings by Iraqis, however, goes only so far; in fact, it breaks down considering Iraqi history. Saddam Hussein himself is probably responsible for the currency that suicide bombing has in Iraq today. During the years of the sanctions, he increasingly used Islamic rhetoric and since 2000, had offered financial rewards for the families of Palestinian suicide bombers, but this was a political strategy designed to safeguard Ba'athist authority while the population suffered under international isolation. The first suicide attack probably caught the Iraqi regime by surprise. However, it recovered quickly to claim that this would be a tactic that would henceforth be used to stop the American advance. Iraqi spokesmen now began to claim that thousands of volunteers from several Arab nations stood ready to carry out suicide attacks. The emphasis was largely on the 'Arab' world rather than the 'Islamic' world, and this pan-Arab orientation has always been a feature of Ba'athist ideology.

If suicide attacks have been taken up so quickly as a means of resistance, Islam is not the only explanation. It is meaningless to debate whether or not the Iraqi people wanted to get rid of Saddam Hussein. The point is the Americans were supposed to be prove better in the bargain. Still recovering from the Allied attacks following the invasion of Kuwait, and the occasional bombing runs during the 1990s, the Iraqi populace was the victim of nearly 20,000 tons of missiles and bombs in the few weeks of the current invasion. But, despite the casualties of the American 'smart' bombing, a sensitive and well-planned engagement policy in Iraq could have won over the Iraqis. Instead, as the American 'liberation' blundered into an ill-prepared, insensitive 'occupation,' the suicide attacks continued. It is impossible to determine whether American troops have been on the alert or whether they have been on tenterhooks, but they have killed innocent Iraqi children, youth, entire families and even policemen. A vicious cycle of violence has resulted, feeding into each other. The sources of the Iraqi opposition are not just the Ba'athist Party's "dead-enders, foreign terrorists and criminal gangs," as the US Secretary of Defence, Donald Rumsfeld, described them, but the people on the street are unwilling to exchange one set of tyrants for another.

In a completely unequal fight, in terms of weapons, resources, and strategy, suicide bombing has become the ultimate weapon of the Iraqi resistance. The speed with which the tactic of suicide bombing has grown in Iraq, considered one of the most progressive Arab nations, contains a warning to the rest of the world. Even if nationalism was the driving force behind the bombings, desperation sooner rather than later takes on the hues of religion. This is especially true, in an environment where terrorism has become a catch-all phrase for any opposition to a US-led West, and is readily identified as being of Islamic origin. The challenge for the world community and the US is to keep the situation in Iraq from turning into a self-fulfilling prophecy of civilisational conflict.