Women are secretaries of state and prime ministers - but people still don't expect women to be involved in violence. Mia Bloom More Quotes by Mia Bloom More Quotes From Mia Bloom The best predictor of a woman's involvement in terrorism, whether it's a secular or religious group, is a relationship with a terrorist: her father, brother, husband or even her son. Terrorism becomes a bit of a family business. Mia Bloom husband brother religious The issue of motherhood is no longer salient. In fact, the very first female bomber for Hamas posed in her last will and testament video with her two kids. Mia Bloom motherhood two kids When I was in Sri Lanka with the [Tamil] Tigers, there were editorials in the paper saying that soldiers really had to stop raping Tamil women at checkpoints because they were just creating more operatives. The [Tigers] were cognizant of this and exploited it: "Don't be a victim, join the movement. Mia Bloom sri-lanka creating soldier Misuse of the Koran to provide legitimacy for violence is common, particularly in Europe, where terrorists tend not to be well-educated Muslims. Mia Bloom violence common europe I did a study of soldiers returning from Iraq, and their levels of PTSD were much higher if they had had to shoot a woman or child, even if they knew the person was a suicide bomber. Mia Bloom iraq suicide children When the bombers are women - and children, which I predict we'll see more of - the terrorists get more bang for their buck, because there's more media attention. Mia Bloom bangs media children It's cheap, and you have a thinking, breathing bomb that can adjust to circumstances and cross the street to hit another target if the original one doesn't look good. Mia Bloom breathing target thinking With a civilian target, female bombers tend to be more successful and cause more damage. Mia Bloom bombers female successful Acts perpetrated by women, particularly attractive women, get far more media attention. Mia Bloom attractive media attention A lot of movements use women's involvement to shame men when recruitment is sagging. Mia Bloom sagging use men The terrorists provide an outlet where with just one action, a raped woman can go from being a source of dishonour to her family to being a source of pride in a culture of martyrdom. Mia Bloom pride action culture It's interesting the degree to which the parents are giving the organization access to their children, it's not a coercive endeavor like what we saw in Africa. The kids are not being kidnapped. The kids are not being coerced. For the most part, what we're seeing is kids posing with a big smile and at least in one case saying goodbye to the parents. Mia Bloom top-news The way you got the kids out of child soldiering in Liberia, Uganda or Mozambique was you use two things. You use the family and you use religion, the problem with ISIS is that they've distorted the religion, and the families are colluding with ISIS to allow them access to the kids. So there's additional challenges, and we don't have a really good template to use ... it's a big problem. Mia Bloom top-news ISIS is integrating children into its project in a way that is more reminiscent of a state than a non-state actor. It's thinking with the long term in mind. It's not just bringing children into its ranks and using them immediately on the battlefield. What it's doing is bringing them in, indoctrinating them, training them, spending a lot of time instilling them with jihadist ideology. Mia Bloom top-news It's certainly ISIS' first female suicide bomber. Mia Bloom top-news Up until now ISIS has been very clear. The role for women is cooking, cleaning and childcare. They do not have women on the front lines. Mia Bloom top-news It's a fantastic vetting mechanism for the terrorist organizations. They are always worried about being infiltrated and so if someone is related to an existing member they feel that they're most trustworthy. So this is something we see -- it's all in the family. Mia Bloom top-news It was done more of a defense mechanism rather than as an act of violence. Islamic State has said in its propaganda many times women are to remain in the home and really their participation in jihad is more nurturing role as a mother and a wife. Mia Bloom top-news
