20 June 2007

Expert Discusses Women in Terrorist Organizations

USINFO Webchat transcript, June 20

Mia Bloom, assistant professor in the School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Georgia, answered questions in a June 20 USINFO Webchat on women involved in global terrorism.

Following is the transcript:

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U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE
Bureau of International Information Programs
USINFO Webchat Transcript

Countering the Terrorist Mentality: Women as Victims and Victimizers

Guest:     Mia Bloom
Date:      June 20, 2007
Time:      10:00 a.m. EST (1400 GMT)

Moderator: Welcome to today's webchat with Dr. Mia Bloom. The webchat will begin at 10:00a.m. EDT/1400 GMT. You may begin sending in your questions now.

Mia Bloom: Hello and good morning, I'm Dr. Bloom, and I'm very pleased to be here... so let's get started.

Question [Jack1]: Could you give some example of women in leadership roles of terror organizations?

Answer [Mia Bloom]: There are several examples of women's leadership in such organizations. The most famous is Ulrike Meinhoff after whom the Baader Meinhoff group was named, the actual leader was named Gudrun Esslin. There was a group named the Red Zora or the Revolutionary cells a largely female terrorist group in Germany and the Russian Revolutionaries of the late 19th century had women in front line roles, most notoriously Vera Sazulich.

Q [Kuba]: Dr. Bloom, in your article you mentioned the 4 Rs: Revenge, Redemption, Respect, and Relationship as motivating factors for female terrorists. To me this paints a grim picture for the chances of pure military success in Iraq and for national reconciliation. If what you say is true, as women in Iraq lose male loved ones in conflict with A. Western forces and B. other ethnic/religious groups, they will be motivated to take up arms. So will we see more women as terrorists in Iraq?

A [Mia Bloom]: I agree with your observation that the situation in Iraq will only become more grim as more women suffer from these "four R's"... we have seen an increasing number of women participate in Iraq, both Iraqi women as well as female converts from Europe. The more male relatives of women get killed as a result of coalition activities the more incentive the groups in Iraq will have to use women. This is especially true as the targets are hardened are women will have the comparative advantage to get passed guards and other security measures.

Moderator: Read Dr. Bloom’s article Women as Victims and Victimizers in the State Department’s eJournalUSA, “Countering the Terrorist Mentality.”

Q [Kuba]: A second observation from your article: That females are NOT given roles of leadership in cells but rather they are used for fodder. So the social repression of women exists despite their acceptance to the ranks of mertyrs? Perhaps then women's education; social freedom, and right to organize political groups is the most powerful weapon against their becoming terrorists. Do you agree?

A [Mia Bloom]: It is a terrific point that the women themselves need to believe that their contribution alive is worth far more than any contribution they make in death. I think the women who participate in suicide terror are deluded in thinking that their sacrifice will be rewarded in some way or that they are leveling patriarchal playing fields.

Women's political mobilization into civil society has a far greater and more positive impact than dying for some cause -- especially one that does not view them as equals.

That said, most women who subscribe to the islamist view of the world may not consider themselves as second class. So part of the problem is one of perception.

Q [Jack1]: One of fundamentalist Islam's complain against the West is that women are too often mixed with men and have too much authority over them. Does this preclude the wider participation of women in these religiously based terror networks?

A [Mia Bloom]: Interestingly enough, several organizations that have employed women first had to deal with this stricture. Initially Sheikh Yassin of Hamas rejected the use of women, precisely because they would be away from their homes for 24 hrs (of course if successful, the women would be away from home longer than that!!) but eventually Hamas and other Palestinian religious groups permitted women suicide bombers if a chaperone was provided.

Among Al Qaeda, there has been a split in the Jihadi doctrine regarding women, some sheikhs are willing to allow women (Qadarawi for example) while other Sheikhs continue to view women's actions as a negative. Until such time that they resolve these internal disputes, women will be used on occasion (when expediency requires it) but the overwhelming number of suicide bombers will be men and women's roles might be a combination of support and the occasional front line activity.

Most of the religious groups elsewhere that were hesitant about using women eventually changed their minds when it became clear that women would be more successful or it became more difficult for the men to carry out operations. So the leaders tend to be innovative and pragmatic when they want to be.

Q [Jack1]: I am surprised terrorist do not use women even more often, since they can more easily pass security checks and in some places be nearly exempt from searches. So my question is not why women are sometimes terrorists, but why are they not terrorists more often?

A [Mia Bloom]: Well terrorism itself is fairly rare. As you may recall from the e journal, John Horgan's article discusses that though many people might feel outraged and even mobilized into terrorist groups, very few become violent activists. So being involved as a terrorist entails many different things that we don't always associate with being a terrorist; there are legal as well as illegal activities. So the women are often involved in a variety of the legal support activities, fund raising, publicity, as well as providing food and shelter for front line activists. In some conflicts, women were very significant in the conflicts. Among the Tamil Tigers for instance, women have formed special units of suicide bombers as well as first rate tank units and front line soldiers -- not at all what we would imagine! In Chechnya, the majority of suicide bombers were women and in Turkey, the Kurdish PKK employed women suicide bombers for precisely the reasons you identified.

Q [Chat Participant]: Is there any research indicates marital status of women as terrorists? Does marriage have effect of limiting a woman's decision to join a terror group?

A [Mia Bloom]: Interestingly enough, the assumption that the women are all unmarried or not marriageable is no longer the case. We have seen women who were single, married, divorced... mothers, women who could not have children... so many of the existing stereotypes no longer apply.

Q [tim]: Do you know what the percentage of women is in terrorist organizations?

A [Mia Bloom]: Women can comprise as much of 60% of the suicide bombers in some cases, whereas they might only be 1/3rd of the total number of people inside the groups, part of what makes this difficult to determine an exact figure is that

1) it varies from conflict to conflict and group to group

2) what it means to "be involved" in a terrorist organization changes.

The kinds of roles vary along a spectrum. I mentioned John Horgan's article in the issue, I would also recommend his book on the subject; The Psychology of Terrorism Routledge Press 2005.

Q [Chat Participant]: You've noted that women terrorists also are harder to detect because of ingrained social attitudes toward women.

Do you see a rise in women involved in terrorist acts in the future?

A [Mia Bloom]: There will absolutely be a rise in women's participation in terrorism in the future. Partly because the groups are exceptionally pragmatic no matter what they claim to be their ideology! I mapped out how Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hamas changed their view about women suicide bombers in my book Dying to Kill. The leadership literally reversed itself on whether it was permissible in Islam for women to be self martyrs (istishhadats)... whereas it appears Al Qaeda is having that same debate at the moment. Zarqawi was always in favor of using women, and so in November 2005, he tasked two women to blow up on the same day. The European Belgian Convert Mariel Degauque was successful, the other woman, Sajida Atrous al Rishawi in Amman was not.

Q [Marek: we have focused on the victimIZERS side of the question. What about the women victims? Do you know if women victims have tried to reach out to women in regions such as Russia/Chenhnya to stop them? Or on a global level? We know Russian mothers made a strong impact on Russian government through "mother's of soldiers" organization.

A [Mia Bloom]: There was an emergence of civil society within Russia of women on both sides of the conflict. For example, women's groups attempted to each across the divide to help each other out, especially those who had lost loved ones. So that if a Chechen body was found in Russia or a Russian soldier's body found in Chechnya there was an exchange. However neither the Russian government nor the Chechen insurgent and terrorist groups were enthusiastic about these initiatives. So women can certainly play a positive role.

Moderator: Today’s webchat is the third in a series of webchats tied to the Department of State’s eJournalUSA “Countering the terrorist Mentality.”

Previous webchats in the series include: George Washington University professor Jerrold Post who discussed Collective Identity: Hatred Bred in the Bone; and Department of State Official Rhonda Shore who discussed A Strategic Assessment of Progress Against the Terrorist Threat.

Q [Jack1]: You are talking about women are terrorists and as victims and you mention that the defense of women is an important part of the culture. Have there been terror attacks specifically aimed at women BECAUSE they were women?

A [Mia Bloom]: There have been allegations that women are sometimes targeted specifically for 'special treatment". I am currently writing a book on how rape is a weapon of warfare and by targeting women, the aggressor side hopes to wear down the morale of the other side or encourage them to disperse! Interestingly enough, women who have been treated in this way often have no where to go BUT to the terrorist groups that embrace them (pragmatically so). There were allegations in Sri Lanka that even when the government troops were not engaging in check point rape of Tamil women that Tamil women might be attacked (by other Tamils!) to get them to join the LTTE. This is a radical allegation and one that requires additional evidence. But I did hear this from two women who had reported the incidents to the UNHCR on the East Coast.

Q [Chat Participant]: Does your research dispell the notion "If only women ran the world"?

A [Mia Bloom]: I don't think so, in an interesting book called Shoot the Women First by Eileen MacDonald, the German security services thought that women would be more fierce than their male counterparts. So I don't think that women leaders would mean a more peaceful world. People often cite Golda Meir, Indira Gandhi and Maggie Thatcher as examples that when women run the world, they might even be more violent (to over compensate maybe for being women in a male world?)

Q [Marek]: Is there any case for hope? Or is it a downward spiral?

A [Mia Bloom]: Wow good question! I honestly think we always have to think there is hope. Part of the problem will be confronting what the responsibility of the US or other countries is in exacerbating conflicts. Without getting too political at the moment, if the vast sums of money being used for every day of the war would be funneled into a sort of Middle eastern Marshall Plan we might see better results. If we understood how democracy needs a positive environment and cannot be imposed from above and by force... if we understood better the role of civil society in bridging differences, we could focus on women's groups in a positive way and not in trying to enforce a vision of how we think things should be.

There have been some successes but the biggest challenge in now because of foreign policy choices, even we the US does admirable and wonderful things, it is largely misinterpreted. So we are very much between a rock and a hard place. The hope I have is because in several conflicts it was once people on the ground determined that violence was not longer a proper response that the groups realized using violence would have a pejorative effect on their power. We need to realize that we cannot de-motivate terrorists, but we can certainly make their tactics unpalatable if the population that the terrorists purport to represent think they can get more through peaceful means than through violence.

Q [Jack1]: Maybe some of it has to do with advances in the technologies of terror. When bombs or weapons are big & heavy, not many women can take an active part in the struggle. But today such things are much smaller and lighter. Can we say that technology is making it possible for women to be more active terrorists?

A [Mia Bloom]: Well when the Russian anarchists threw dynamite into crowds there was still a certain light weapons aspect... the technology have certainly improved the portability of weapons. I have often heard this reason to explain the rise of child soldiers, that the weapons are smaller and easier for small hands to grasp. However, part of the reason women are so successful is that we have pre-existing assumptions about the roles of women in these conflicts. It is as if we forgot what a crucial role women played in the Algerian war of independence. The film Battle of Algiers has a terrific scene where the women transform themselves by cutting their hair, wearing makeup and French clothing and all of a sudden they are able to get through the checkpoints. I think we need to shift our assumptions about women.

The technology aspect is important as their have been numerous chlorine suicide bombs, which for me portents a future trend towards combining suicide terrorism with chemical attacks. However, luckily for coalition troops, the heat of the bomb burns away the chlorine! If the technology the terrorists use improves, we may see another tactical innovation.

Q [Jack1]: Do you have any figures for women's participation in cyber "terrorism"? Disrupting sophisticated electronic networks can cause more economic and political damage than an actual attack and may be the wave of the future. Are women prominent in these activities? BTW - I think Thatcher and Meir were engaged in "just war" and should not be lumped into the same violent category as the bad guys we are discussing.

A [Mia Bloom]: We know virtually nothing about this, it is an area badly in need of more research. Not even Gabriel Weyman has disaggregated the figures. I have heard Marc Sageman reference that the internet allows women jihadis to become mobilized into the cause (and use the internet to become radicalized) because they can obscure the fact that they are women.

Regarding Thatcher, if you ask someone in Northern Ireland they would argue that if anything, her policies increased support for the IRA... in particular her mismanagement of the hunger strikes. As for Meir, well, Israel's policy of targeted assassination (poorly depicted in the movie Munich -- but much better described in Bar Zohar's "Quest for the Red prince") show her willingness to use violence as part of [Counter Terrorism] including carrying out targeted killings or strategic beheadings. Such examples indicate that both female leaders were complex. The just war notion is also one of viewpoint. The Pope last month said Iraq was not a just war, I don't think the administration agrees...

Mia Bloom: I wanted to thank all of you for participating in the webchat. It was a pleasure discussing these issues with you. If you have questions that occur to you at a later date, feel free to contact me at the University of Georgia e mail address listed on line. Best wishes, Mia Bloom

Moderator: We wish to thank Mia Bloom for joining us today. The webchat is now closed. Please visit our USINFO Webchat Station homepage for more information on upcoming events and a transcript of today’s discussion (posted within one business day).

(Guests are chosen for their expertise. The views expressed by guests are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of the U.S. Department of State.)

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