What is Terrorism?

These days, there is much talk of terrorism. Across the globe, people are writing and talking about it. But, as far I know, no clear definition of the term has emerged as yet. People condemn terrorism but, still, they are not able to clearly define what it is.

I have tried to understand this question in the light of Islamic teachings. Based on my study and analysis, I define terrorism as armed struggle by non-governmental actors.

According to Islamic teachings, any person or party has the right to launch a peaceful movement for national or political purposes. They retain this right as long as they do not, directly or indirectly, engage in aggression. In Islam, only a duly established government has the right to use arms or to engage in military action, if there is a genuine need for it. Non-governmental organisations do not have the right to take up arms under any pretext. I have written about this Islamic ruling in detail in several of my books.

According to internationally accepted principles, established governments have the right to punish criminals and to engage in defense against attackers. This is an Islamic principle, too. In the light of this principle, one could define terrorism as stated above as armed action engaged in by a non-governmental organisation. No matter what pretext for resorting to violence a non-governmental organisation may employ, its violent actions are, under all circumstances, unacceptable. If a non-governmental organisation feels that there is injustice in a certain country or that human rights are being violated, it has the right only to make efforts to address the situation by using peaceful means. Under no circumstances and under no pretext is it permissible for it to adopt violent methods.

Suppose an individual or a non-governmental organisation were to argue, ‘We want to work peacefully, but our opponents are not ready to give us our rights even if we use peaceful means. In these circumstances, what can we do?’

The answer to this is that the responsibility for these matters lies with the government, and not with non-governmental organisations. If someone feels that the government is failing to live up to its responsibilities, even then it is impermissible for him to take on what is the government’s work. Even in these conditions he has to choose between only two alternatives: either to exercise patience, or else to make peaceful efforts. That is to say, either he can do nothing at all, or he can engage in peaceful efforts.

Here, the question arises about the Islamic ruling about state terrorism, that is, when the state engages in the same sort of undesirable violence as non-governmental terrorist organisations. What is the Islamic ruling in such a situation? The answer is that this sort of governmental violence represents a state’s misusing a right that it possesses, while violence is for non-governmental organisations something that they have no right to engage in at all, under any circumstances. Clearly, there is a fundamental difference between doing something which one has no right whatsoever to do, on the one hand, and misusing a right that one is legally entitled to.

In other words, if a non-governmental organisation engages in violence, the Islamic ruling is that, without even asking it on what grounds or pretext it has resorted to violence, it must completely abstain from it. In contrast, if an established government were to engage in inappropriate violence, it would be told that it must use its right to employ violence only in a legally permissible manner. By misusing this right, a government can turn itself into an anarchical body, as is the case of a non-governmental organisation.

This point can be understood with the help of a simile. Suppose a surgeon uses his surgical knife to operate on the wrong part of a patient’s body. In this case, he would be guilty of misusing a right that he is entitled to. A trained surgeon definitely has the right to use his surgical knife to operate on the correct part of a patient’s body, but he has no right to cut off a wrong part. In contrast to this, if a person who is not a surgeon starts to use a knife on someone’s body, it would be wrong under all circumstances, because he does not have the right to wield a knife against anyone else at all.