I am not sure which all countries are targeted. I used to think it was only the US & Israel, but i have heard that France & Germany have lost more people to terrorism than the US (can’t remember where i heard that). So is Islamic fundamentalist terrorism an issue that only affects the US & Israel or is it an international problem that affects many nations? By Islamic fundamentalists i mean anyone of mid east origin who commits terrorism with Islamic overtones.
Islamic fundamentalist radicals also committed many terrorist acts on Egyptian soil, although they were generally directed at foreigners with the intent of disrupting the tourist industry. The objective was not so much to kill foreigners per se but to attack an important part of the Egyptian economy to blackmail the government. The Egyptian government is technically secular (e.g., U.S. government is technically secular but Christmas is a national holiday, In God We Trust, and all that) and the radical factions wanted an Islamic government. The Egyptian government has subsequently gotten this under control following a particularly egregious massacre at the Temple of Hatshepsut near the Valley of the Kings.
India has suffered significant terrorism from muslim fundamentalist over the years. And there was that bomb that went off in Bali Indonesia last year too.
I strongly doubt that France lost more people to terrorism than the USA during the recent years (assuming you’re including the 9/11 attack, it would mean thousands of victims).
If you don’t take into account the planned attacks which have failed or have been prevented by the police/intelligence services (the most serious being the attempt to crash a plane in the Eiffel Tower, 6 or 7 years ago), there hasn’t been any successful terrorist attack in France since the mid-90’s “wawe” (these attacks were planned by algerian muslim fundamentalists, since France was supporting the Algerian government they were fighting…I realy don’t remember how many people were killed…but no more than some dozens including all these bombings).
There has been some attacks agaisnt french citizens/militaries abroad, though. The most recent (last year) being the bombing of a bus transporting technicians from the french ministery of defense who were building submarines in Pakistan (a dozen of victims???) and an attack against a french ship in the gulf which didn’t make any victim (or perhaps one?). The attack during which the most people have been killed at once was the suicide bombing against french military barracks in Lebanon (around 50 victims), but it happened 20 years ago, so it’s not exactly recent.
There has been in the past some attacks against Jewish buildings/businesses (the most well known being agaisnt a famous Jewish restaurant, during the 80’s), but none recently (there has been minor attacks against Jewish buildings last year, but they weren’t terrorist attacks but crimes against property commited by local dissafected youth muslims…not the same thing at all).
You were refering to islamic fundamentalist terrorists, but I will add that terrorist attacks commited by Corsican independantists (and sometimes Bretons…the most incredibly stupid terrorist attack was commited by Breton independantists who bombed one of the major symbols of the french government…a Mc Donald restaurant :rolleyes: , killing a girl in the process) killed some people. Very occasionnally, since they try to avoid to kill anybody (bombing public buildings during the night when there’s nobody in them, for instance).
It’s a wild guess, but I would suspect that the total number of french people, in France and abroad, killed during terrorist attacks commited by muslim fundamentalists or related groups during the twenty last years and targeting specifically france or french interests (so not including people who could have been killed during an attack actually targeting another country) could be in the 100-150 range.