Page 155 - Age of Peace Goodword.indd

The Age of Peace

‘“The longer I live,” he continued, “the more this question
drills itself into my brain and the more I wonder why
the Lord allowed man to have the devilish desires of
envy, greed and aggression.”’
1
This is true also of terrorists. Terrorism begins with hate and
ends with repentance. If the suicide bombers were questioned
after carrying out their attacks, they would acknowledge that
they had committed a very heinous crime. But, unfortunately,
we never have the chance to speak to them.

Terrorism always ends in repentance. Terrorism
thus has a self-deterrent characteristic—that is,
after engaging in a terrorist act the extremist immediately
realizes that he had erred.

However, there are some examples of perpetrators of
terrorist acts who were not themselves killed and who suffered
pangs of remorse. One such example is that of Lee Boyd Malvo
(b. 1985), a Jamaican-American convicted murderer who,
along with John Allen Muhammad, committed murders in
connection with the Beltway sniper attacks in the Washington
Metropolitan Area over a three-week period in October
2002. Malvo said in a letter to CNN that he was still ‘grappling
with shame, guilt, remorse and my own healing, if that will
ever be possible.’ And a social worker who worked extensively
with him said he draws self-portraits that often show him with
a tear running down his cheek.
2
Terrorism always ends in repentance. Terrorism thus has
a self-deterrent characteristic—that is, after engaging in a
terrorist act the extremist immediately realizes that he had
erred. For this reason, terrorism should have come to an end.
But not all would-be terrorists think in this way; very few of
them desist from violence in order to lead a peaceful life.

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