What is a Terrorist?

Definitions of Terrorists

• Towards a Definition of Terrorism - Ayatullah Shaykh Muhammad ‘Ali Taskhiri - Vol V No. 1 (Muharram 1408 AH/1987 CE)
• Terrorism: No Prohibition Without Definition - Suggests a clearly delineated definition
• The definition of terrorism - from the Guardian Unlimited - Raises many questions about the US state department’s definition
• Definition of Terrorism - by Carroll E. Payne Jr - Very brief definition offered by one individual
• FREEDOM FIGHTER: Dictionary Entry and Meaning - from hyperdictionary - Dictionary definition
• TERRORISTS AND FREEDOM FIGHTERS - from the CBC News - Provides a comprehensive overview of the implications and the media’s use of the word.
• CIA’s Director of Central Intelligence Counterterrorist Center - Provides the definition used by the US

Timothy McVeigh

• The worst terrorist attack on U.S. soil: April 19, 1995
• What happened at Waco?
• Timothy McVeigh Timeline - from CNN / People Magazine
• Oklahoma City Bombing Remembered - by CNN
• Wounds remain for bombing victims six years later
• Imitating Turner - from Crime TV’s Crime Library

Possible Questions

1) Where was McVeigh in 1991?

2) What was inside the rental trucked parked outside the Murrah Building?

3) How did McVeigh support himself before the bombing?

4) What were Ruby Ridge and Waco and what impact did they have on McVeigh?

5) What happened to McVeigh in June, 2001?

The Black Panthers

• The Black Panther: Guerrilla War in the US
• Nat Turner’s Rebellion - from PBS’s Africans in America
• Racial Equality - from the White Camelia Knights (KKK)
• Fred Hampton
• from the Vision of the Black Panthers

Possible Questions

1) What were some of the most important of the 10 Points in the Panther’s program?
2) What were the reasons for the arrests of Black Panthers in 1967?
3) Are the Black Panthers and Nat Turner’s rebellions mostly similar or different? In what important ways?
4) By the end of 1969, how many children every day were fed through the efforts of the Black Panthers?
5) What happened to Fred Hampton in 1969? How many shots were fired and by whom?
6) What is the source for most of the references used by the KKK to argue for racial separation?
7) How did the Black Panthers’ see Democracy in America? Do you think this is reasonable and logical? Explain.

Task: So what is a terrorist?

Mindmap or list all the characteristics of a terrorist.” If you can show relationships among the qualities, that’s even better.