NCJ Number
91785
Date Published
1982
Length
10 pages
Annotation
This analysis of Palestinian terrorist acts and other casualties in Israel between 1967 and 1978 highlights discrepancies between actual losses and resources expended and suggests policy changes to downgrade terrorism's impact.
Abstract
The author, an Israeli military official, comments that the first surprise uncovered by his research was the low number of casualties inflicted by terrorists, .5 percent of all exogenous deaths and injuries. The second was that 61.9 percent of all casualty prevention expenditures was allocated to countering terrorism and only 2.9 percent to road and car safety. Explosives accounted for a large number of Palestinian terrorist strikes and inflicted the highest number of casualties. However, only 3 percent of the resources allocated to counterterrorist measures was devoted to bomb disposal, while the remainder was consumed by participational programs and passive defense. The answer to these discrepancies lies partly in the Israeli perception of terrorism as a major threat. The author proposes a new terrorist countermeasure -- downgrading the effects of terrorism -- and a cost-effective approach to allocating resources which replaces the objective of reducing casualties with that of minimizing the casualty total. Specifically, the government should not allocate additional money to counterterrorist efforts, but give it to car and road safety programs. It should abolish participational measures such as mandatory school guards, focus on impeding terrorists' use of explosives, and educate the public about the actual extent of the terrorist threat. Graphs and maps are included.