Summary:
“Terrorism may well be the most important word in the political vocabulary these days”, as stated by Schmid (2004), and yet, there is a critical lack of a unified international definition on terrorism, which means there are hundreds of characterizations from various sources. For this paper the definition given by Boaz Ganor (2002) will be used: “Terrorism is the intentional use of, or threat to use violence against civilians or against civilian targets, in order to attain political aims”. What is important to note is that the aims are always political, which has allowed for a smooth transition into a hybrid terrorist organisation on many fronts. This will be discussed further below, however, it is essential to have a basis of what a terrorist organisation is, before discussing the evolution into a hybrid terrorist organisation. This paper will focus on Islamist terrorist organisations and on two case studies: Hamas and Hezbollah.
Daniella is an undergraduate student at the Interdisciplinary Centre in Herzilya, Israel, studying government and diplomacy with specialisation in counter terrorism and global affairs. She served in the IDF (Israeli Defence Forces) as a Commander of Foreign Relations for the Elite Combat Engineering Corps.
She is currently working on a research project relating to the corona virus pandemic, looking into the effects on various countries and the respective responses by the governments and also working on the research project pertaining to the conduct of hostilities and international humanitarian law, in particular relation to nonstate actors. Daniella is a participant in the ICRC IHL competition in the Israeli nationals.
