Does Human Rights Law Apply to Terrorists? (Middle East Quarterly, Fall 2004)

The following by Ted Lapkin is reposted here with permission of Middle East Forum:

Does Human Rights Law Apply to Terrorists?

by Ted Lapkin
Middle East Quarterly
Fall 2004, pp. 3-13

From Manhattan to Mindanao, Islamist zealots draw no distinction between combatants and non-combatants. Jihadists target women, children, and the elderly without even the pretence of discrimination. In June 2004, an Al-Qaeda affiliated group distributed a video proudly documenting the beheading of a U.S. civilian, proclaiming: "the mujahedeen from the Fallujah Squadron slaughtered the American hostage Paul Johnson."[1] By spurning the laws of armed conflict, Islamist terrorists have created a conundrum for democracies: how do you fight people who throw the rulebook of warfare out the window?

Nazis and Islamists

The United States has faced such challenges before. In early morning darkness on June 13, 1942, a German U-boat surfaced off the coast of Long Island. Four men wearing German naval uniforms piled into a rubber dinghy and headed for shore. They buried their uniforms on the beach and headed toward their objective dressed in civilian clothes.^[2] Four nights later, another German unit came ashore in northern Florida. After hitting the beach, they too discarded their uniforms.