ABSTRACT
By their sheer scale, the 11 September attacks drew a bright line between the ‘new terrorism’ practised by al-Qaeda and the ‘old terrorism’ exemplified by groups like the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO), the Provisional Irish Republican Army (IRA), Euskadi to Askatasuna (ETA) and the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam. 1 The distinction itself, however, is nothing new. Since Osama bin Laden surfaced in the 1990s, terrorism experts have noted that his apocalyptic vision of the United States and its allies internationally debilitated by radical Islam is not amenable to political negotiation. Bin Laden does not make demands as such, and only elliptically claims credit for acts of terror, often long after the fact. What drives him to kill is essentially religious hatred. Older groups like the PLO or the IRA are generally constrained by nationalist or irredentist goals – a Palestinian state, a united Ireland – that are negotiable. They present their demands clearly, and generally take direct responsibility for their acts in order to make it clear to their adversaries that the bloodletting will stop when those demands are met. What motivates their violence is the desire to obtain a particular political result. Old terrorists are looking to bargain; new terrorists want only to express their wrath and cripple their enemy. 2
