Women who serve as supporters of terrorism and as agents of terror. Although the idea of female terrorists is surprising and even shocking to many people, women have been supporters, active participants, and even leaders in terrorist acts throughout history. In the modern era, female terrorists have been known in all parts of the world, although their motivation may differ from that of their male counterparts.
Statistical evidence based on arrests and other reports indicates that female participation in modern terrorism, particularly in leftist terrorist groups, has been notably high. In European terrorist groups, women have typically made up about a third of the membership (Hudson 1999, 82). At least one German terrorist group, Red Zora, recruited only women for numerous terrorist acts in the late 1970s and 1980s; the Norwegian terrorist group Valkyria also excluded males from membership. Women were prominent participants in the activities of most late-twentieth-century German terrorist groups, such as the Baader-Meinhof Gang, the Red Army Faction, and the June Second Movement. Female terrorists have been equally common in the Irish Republican Army; the Basque separatist group, Euskadi ta Askata-suna (ETA); various Italian terrorist groups; and the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) in Turkey. Latin American insurgent groups have similarly recruited large numbers of women; the Sendero Luminoso (the Shining Path) and Tupac Amaru terrorist groups have reported that half their members are female. Colombian terrorist groups claim a large percentage of female participants; in the 1985 M19 (19th of April Movement) terrorist attack on Colombia’s Palace of Justice, more than half the terrorists were women.
The United States has also had its share of female terrorists; about 8 percent of all persons indicted for terrorist crimes in the United States have been women (Hewett 2003, 69). In the 1970s Americans were familiar with photographs of the kidnapped heiress Patricia Hearst, posing next to the flag of the Symbionese Liberation Army with her assault weapon as she apparently prepared to carry out terrorist acts in California with the group, which had a large female component.
Nor has women’s participation in terrorism been confined to Western societies. The Japanese Red Army and the religious terrorist group Aum Shin Rikyo have had numerous female members. North Korea has long-standing training programs for female terrorists, as revealed by Hyun Hee Kim, an infamous North Korean female terrorist who killed more than 100 people by bombing a South Korean airliner and who later recounted her training in a gripping book.
Female terrorists have appeared in Nepal, Sri Lanka, India, and elsewhere in Asia. Finally, the participation of women in terrorist attacks throughout the Muslim world has been increasing dramatically in the past few decades. It can generally be said that anywhere terrorists operate, there will be women supporting them and actively participating in their attacks.
Women are often prized participants in terrorist attacks because security forces are less likely to suspect them, and it is easier for women to infiltrate close to an intended target. Stereotypes about the natural role of women as life-givers and "the gentler sex" contribute to the image that women are less likely to resort to terrorism than men. There is also evidence that female terrorists are more likely to gain sympathy for their acts and to be punished less severely.
Although some scholars have opined that women are less likely than men to be leaders in terrorist acts, this does not appear to be the case. Prominent female terrorist leaders of modern times include: Dora Mana Tellez Arguello, who acted as second-in-command when a San-dinista terrorist unit attacked Nicaragua’s National Palace in 1979; Suzanne Albrecht of the Red Army Faction, who arranged to assassinate a wealthy German businessman and family friend; Ulrike Meinhof of the Baader-Meinhof Gang, who committed suicide in prison in 1976 as an example to her followers; Soledad Ipar-raguirre of the ETA, who has plotted numerous terrorist attacks in Spain; and Fusako Shigenobu, who founded the Japanese Red Army, trained fellow terrorists all over the world, and evaded Japanese authorities for three decades.
The news media have prominently covered stories about female terrorists, raising awareness of their existence among the public and perhaps even encouraging other women to follow their example. In the 1970s, for example, Palestinian terrorist and hijacker Leila Khaled became internationally famous and a heroine in the Arab world when her photos appeared in major news media. The photos, in which a smiling Khaled posed with her assault rifle, purportedly convinced other Palestinian women to train as terrorists and may even have inspired writer John Le Carre to pen the best-selling novel The Little Drummer Girl, about an actress who pretends to be a female terrorist in order to infiltrate a terrorist network. Le Carre’s book was made into a popular film, following a cinematic tradition of celebrating the acts of female terrorists, a tradition perhaps begun by the film Battle of Algiers. This 1966 film by Italian director Gillo Pon-tecorvo depicts a female Algerian terrorist slipping easily with her bombs through French security checkpoints after dressing provocatively and flirting with the male guards.
Although women have often been recruited for terrorist acts because security forces are less likely to suspect them, they have frequently been even more ruthless in action than male terrorists. Female terrorists have also been described as more focused and practical than male terrorists and able to use their social skills to keep groups focused on their goals. Christian Lochte, a German terrorism expert, has argued that female terrorists are generally more single-minded and dangerous than male terrorists and that, for safety reasons, "it is a good idea to shoot the women terrorists first" if security forces encounter both male and female terrorists at the same time (Hudson 1999, 89).
Female terrorists are often motivated by the same anger and desire for revenge that motivate male terrorists, but studies have found some significant gender differences. Female terrorists, for example, are often more committed to their cause, more idealistic, and more prone to turn to terrorism to please others or as a way to achieve others’ unfulfilled needs. Feminist ideology has also motivated female terrorists and may explain in part their observed ruthlessness.
A special category of female terrorists is composed of female suicide bombers. The first female suicide bomber to successfully carry out a major bombing attack was Dhanu, a member of the Sri Lankan terrorist group Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE, also known as the Tamil Tigers). She assassinated former Indian Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi in 1991 by approaching him to offer flowers and then blowing herself up. She killed many bystanders as well. The Tamil Tigers have trained brigades of young girls in these techniques, and their female terrorists have carried out dozens of attacks.
Islamic terrorists have also made use of female suicide bombers. The first female Islamic suicide bomber appeared in Lebanon in the mid-1980s, when Syrian intelligence officers encouraged young Lebanese women to carry out suicide attacks against Israeli military units. The first known female Palestinian to engage in such attacks was Wafa Idris, who blew herself up in a store in Jerusalem in 2002, killing an elderly Israeli man and wounding more than 100 bystanders. She had been encouraged to commit her act by a speech made by Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat, who termed her a soldier in his "army of roses." Many other Palestinian women followed her example, and their exploits have been celebrated in Palestinian popular culture. In an interesting study of Palestinian women who have engaged in such attacks, author Barbara Victor has noted that these women have often been cajoled to carry out suicide attacks by male relatives or boyfriends who have convinced the women that, by carrying out a suicide bombing, they could atone for stains on their family honor or their inability to meet male social expectations (Victor 2003, 4, 19, 20, and 25).
In contrast, Chechen Black Widow suicide bombers have sought revenge against Russians who have killed their husbands or brothers in the wars in Chechnya, a breakaway province of Russia. These female terrorists, who sometimes dress in head-to-toe black attire with explosive belts around their waists, first came to prominence in 2002, when they seized a crowded Moscow theater in the middle of a performance and threatened to blow it up. The siege ended when Russian forces stormed the theater, killing most of the terrorists. Other Black Widows have been involved in numerous smaller terrorist attacks throughout Russia, but their specialty is causing mass casualties. According to Russian authorities, Chechen female terrorists destroyed two Russian airliners by planting bombs on them in 2004. Also in 2004, female Chechen terrorists participated prominently in the hostage crisis and massacre of more than 300 schoolchildren and teachers in Beslan, Russia. There have been some allegations, however, that some of these women were drugged or otherwise coerced into participating in their terrorist acts.
