Homeland Security and Terrorism

There are many terrorist groups in the Middle East, the most prominent of which are Al Qaeda and Hezbollah. There are various techniques which these organizations use to gain recognition, support and power. These techniques are social, economic, and at times, political in nature. In this paper, we shall analyze some of these techniques and how they have helped strengthen these organizations. Terrorist organizations always claim to be fighting for the social justice of the people of the Middle East. They state that their main aim in undertaking actions of terror against their governments, the state of Israel, or the interests of the United States is because these are corrupt countries which are the symbol of all that is bad in the world. Not only do they do this, but these organizations also run social welfare programs in those areas they control and a good example of this is Hezbollah in Lebanon. This ensures that there is no lack of support for these groups and further, they are guaranteed a base for the recruitment of fighters. Because of the sectarian divisions in the Middle East, terrorist organizations find it easy to gain some political support from some prominent members of government who sympathize with them. These ensure that members of the organization have safe places where they can operate without any interference from the government. It can be said that external forces in the Middle East, such as the American and NATO’s military presence, have helped strengthen these organizations. For example, the power vacuum left from the ousting of Saddam Hussein in Iraq ensured that the presence of Al Qaeda was expanded to this country.