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Why Is Terrorism Is Morally Justifiable?

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The purpose of the essay is to explore the morality of terrorism. It will not consider the morality of the person who perpetrates the act of terrorism but rather the morality of what is done and the methods used to do it. Is terrorism morally justifiable? The first difficulty is in arriving at a definition of terrorism itself. The United States Department of Defence defines terrorism as
“The unlawful use of violence or threat of violence, often motivated by religious, political, or other ideological beliefs, to instill fear and coerce governments or societies in pursuit of goals that are usually political.” (DOD 2015).
As is to be expected from a military organisation this definition is narrow and is not even used by other departments in the same government. The FBI’s definition of terrorism is actually divides terrorism into 2 parts - International and Domestic as follows
"International terrorism" means activities with the following three characteristics:
• Involve violent …show more content…
It defines terrorism as any kind of force which is used against non-combatants, that is a civilian population which would include people working for the State that the terrorism is being practice against such as tax collectors or other civil servants. A claim is made by some terrorism groups that the civilian population of any country is a legitimate target because they pay the taxes which support the State and they have not taken any action to remove the ‘oppressive’ regime. This extreme interpretation would mean that there is nobody in the world who cannot be considered a legitimate target for a terrorist. Shortly after the attacks in Paris in January 2015 Al Qaeda named all of Ireland as a legitimate target because it allowed US planes to refuel at its airports (Cathal McMahon/The Mirror Newspaper 2015). However, such a claim is ridiculous and should be

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