Terrorist attacks are a way of life in our world
today. The sad truth is that these attacks are occurring with more and more
frequency. To the Americans, Benghazi was an outrage. In November, another U.S. embassy was
attacked and our citizens were killed.
But do you know how many people are targeted and killed by terrorists
over a one month period?
On January 19 another terrorist attack occurred.
While the continent where the attack occurred was the same (Africa); the
country was different (Eastern Algeria, not Libya). Is Africa becoming a terrorist strong-hold
like the Middle East?
In an effort to wage war on a visible, world-wide
stage, al Qaeda attacked a remote gas facility in Eastern Algeria, which lasted
three days and resulted in the death of 23 foreigners and an unknown number of
extremists. Moktar Belmoktar a member of who is the leader of Al-Mulathameen
Brigade branch off of al Qaeda has taken responsibility for the hostage attack.
While the stated reason for the attack was to punish Algeria for granting
France permission to use Algerian airspace when France launched an offensive
attack on Mali, were the terrorists targeting instead multi-national targets?
There were hostages taken from numerous countries
around the world: Columbia, France, Japan, Malaysia, Norway, Romania, United
Kingdom, and the United States. Many countries offered their assistance to
Algeria but they refused all assistance. Why would Algeria refuse the help from
other countries when it comes to freeing hostages? Could more hostages of been
saved if all the nations worked together?
This article connects to our course because while
terrorism has grown up in the Middle East it is now expanding. It is working to shake up (struggling or not
so struggling) democracies around the globe.
And refugees continue to move out of countries where human rights are threatened.
The influx of these people economically and socio-politically taxes the
neighboring countries which bring another new and unique set of challenges to countries
whose economies are already fragile.
---Katie Juhl
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