2011-05-29

The Ironies of Osama bin Laden

Terrorism should be viewed as a form of social cancer where an understanding of the root causes is necessary. Many of the terrorists who volunteer to be suicide bombers are intelligent and educated middle-class youths. The civilised world must wake up and understand why these people resort to such drastic action.

It must be due to the perceived gross injustices and poverty prevalent in many countries and regions.

One important issue to resolve would be the historic and present suffering of and the injustices
inflicted on the Palestinian people. This case has often been used by these terrorists to justify their actions.

Once this issue is resolved satisfactorily and fairly, it would also make it much more difficult for the leaders of Al Qaeda or other similar organisations to use it as a rallying call to recruit young people to carry out terrorist activities.

Like fighting any disease, if you remove the root causes rather than just deal with the symptoms, the world should be able solve the problem of terrorism in the long term.

source: http://epaper.sun2surf.com/friday/pdf/theSun2011051320.pdf