{"id":87599,"date":"2019-04-24T15:35:03","date_gmt":"2019-04-24T22:35:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=87599"},"modified":"2019-04-24T15:35:03","modified_gmt":"2019-04-24T22:35:03","slug":"the-phenomenon-of-suicide-bombing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2019\/04\/24\/the-phenomenon-of-suicide-bombing\/","title":{"rendered":"The Phenomenon of Suicide Bombing"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ruwan M Jayatunge M.D.<\/span><\/em><\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n

On Easter Sunday Sri\nLanka suffered suicide bombers attacks\nwhich resulted over 300 deaths. At least 45 children were among those that\nperished. The Isis has\nclaimed responsibility for these suicide bombings. Thesesuicide bombings\nare the results of religious fundamentalism. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Suicide terrorism is\nnot a modern phenomenon.  Suicide attack is an ancient practice with\na modern history. The threat of suicide bombing\nattacks has escalated worldwide (Almogy et al., 2004).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

As described by\nHorowitz (2015) a suicide bombing is an attack where the death of the bomber is\nthe means by which the attack is accomplished. Suicide bomber\ncould be defined as an individual carrying high explosive device, attached to\nhis\/her body and must be recognized as a separate medicolegal entity (Ruwanpura et al., 2008).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Martyrdom operations\nare the targeted use of self-destructing humans against noncombatant typically\ncivilian populations to effect political change (Atran, 2003). The suicide\nterrorism is an operational method in which the very act of the attack is\ndependent upon the death of the perpetrator (Boaz, 2000). The attacker does not expect to survive the\nmission.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The literature on\nsuicide terrorism has been dominated by political and social\ntheories (Sheehan, 2014). Psychological, social and political forces\ncontribute to suicide terrorism. Often collective identity motivates their\nterrorist behavior.  Indoctrination is a unique feature of suicide\nterrorism (Grimland, Apter, & Kerkhof, 2006). Also group dynamics play a\nmajor role (Jayatunge, 2008). Although religion is not a single, simple causal\nfactor in terrorist violence, religious elements often feature strongly in the\nbelief systems associated with terrorist violence(Rogers\net al., 2007). Miller (2006) states that psychological and religious dynamics\nare often associated with suicide terrorism. In addition the cultures of\nmartyrdom is a contributing factor in suicide operations (Hafez, 2007).<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The psychology of suicide terrorism is complex. The Suicide\nattackers do not operate in a vacuum (Jayatunge, 2008). Suicide bombing is the result of a\nhighly complex interaction between many forces (Grimland et al., 2006).Suicide\nterrorism is strategically planned, rather than randomly performed by\nindividual fanatics (Kao & McAlister, 2018). For suicide terrorists personal identity, which has\nbeen shattered by helplessness, shame, and humiliation, is replaced by group\nidentity (Volkan, 1997). Suicide bombing are best understood when analyzed\non personality level, an organizational level, and an environmental level.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Suicide bombers have\ncommon psychological features such as isolation, feelings of emptiness, cold\nrationality, a lack of empathy, and a lust for martyrdom and death (Marazziti\nDet al., 2018). Townsend (2007) hypothesized that suicide bombers are not truly\nsuicidal and should not be viewed as a subgroup of the general suicide population.According to Townsend (2007)\nsuicide is associated with psychopathology, and suicide terrorists do not\nexhibit overt psychopathology. Furthermore suicide terrorism has murderous\nintent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

There are connections\nbetween mental illness and terrorism (Weatherston\n& Moran, 2003). Psychiatric disorders such as depression and PTSD are\nhigher among the suicide bombers (Sheehan, 2014). Suicide bombers can commit an\nextreme form of violence without any remorse.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ruwan M Jayatunge M.D. On Easter Sunday Sri Lanka suffered suicide bombers attacks which resulted over 300 deaths. At least 45 children were among those that perished. The Isis has claimed responsibility for these suicide bombings. Thesesuicide bombings are the results of religious fundamentalism.  Suicide terrorism is not a modern phenomenon.  Suicide attack is an ancient practice with a modern […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[68],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-87599","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-dr-ruwan-m-jayatunge-m-d"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87599","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=87599"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/87599\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=87599"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=87599"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=87599"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}