suicide bombing, n.Definitions

Suicide bombing is the nuclear weapon of the poor.

Suicide bombing is an act of 'passionate identification' and an unbearable intimacy shared in the final moments of individuals.

Suicide bombing is, as a phenomenon, less about why suicide bombers commit suicide bombing than about why we are so fascinated with it.

Suicide bombing is at least understandable as the desperate wish of a human being who feels himself being crowded out of life and all of his surroundings, who sees his fellow citizens, other palestinians, his parents, sisters, and brothers, suffering, being injured, or being killed. He wants to do something, to strike back.

Suicide bombing is morally equivalent with aerial bombardment. To say otherwise (as either side might) is to give one moral superiority over the other, and thus serve to perpetuate the horrors of our time.