The concept of terrorism is as old as human history. Broadly defined, “terrorism” is the use of force to inflict terror and in doing so coerce a person or group to act in a certain way. By this definition, any violent action can be considered terrorism.
The United Nations “Academic Consensus Definition” states, in part, “Terrorism is an anxiety-inspiring method of repeated violent action, employed by (semi-) clandestine individual, group, or state actors, for idiosyncratic, criminal or political reasons, whereby—in contrast to assassination—the direct targets are not the main targets.”
The United States Department of Defense includes in its definition that terrorism is the “calculated use of unlawful violence to inculcate fear; intended to coerce or intimidate governments or societies in pursuit of goals that are generally political, religious, or ideological.”
And the Terrorism Research web site sums it up by stating, “Terrorism is a criminal act that influences an audience beyond the immediate victim.”
Over the centuries there have been many famous examples of terrorist activity, and the victims have ranged from politicians to soldiers to children in day care centers and schools.
Noted here are some of the key dates relating to the history of terrorism and related topics, but this is not intended to be a complete timeline of terrorism, by any stretch of the imagination.
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November 1605: The Gunpowder Plot—a group of English conspirators plan to bomb the House of Lords to kill King James I of England, his family, and Parliament. Guy Fawkes placed in charge of executing the plot.
1609: British and Scottish Protestants of the British colonial plantation in Ulster confiscate the land owned by the native residents of Northern Ireland.
Fall 1675: Members of several Native American tribes, including the Nipmuck and Wampanoag tribes, ambush British soldiers and kill 71 at “Bloody Brook.”
October 1675: Members of the Nipmuck, Wampanoag, Agawam, and other Native American tribes attack Hatfield. Northampton, and Springfield, MA, destroying 30 houses.
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February 29, 1704: A force of French and Indians kill 56 English men, women, and children, capture 109, and destroy half of Deerfield, MA.
1754-1663: The French and Indian War, also known as the Seven Years War, in North America.
December 14, 1763: Nearly 60 frontiersmen, “the Paxton Boys,” kill eight in a Susquehanna Indian village in Conestoga, PA.
April 19, 1775: The Battle of Lexington and Concord (MA) marks the beginning of the American Revolutionary War.
July 3, 1778: British rangers and Cayuga and Seneca natives, led by Col. John Butler, destroy settlement of Forty Fort in Pennsylvania, executing patriots and settlers and destroying approximately 1,000 homes.
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May 28, 1830: “Indian Removal Act,” passed by United States Congress, signed into law by President Andrew Jackson.
1838-1839: “The Trail of Tears”—4,000 Cherokee Indians die in forced relocation to Oklahoma.
December 24, 1865: Ku Klux Klan formed in the United States by veterans of Confederate Army from Pulaski, TN.
1871: Civil Rights Act of 1871, also called the Ku Klux Klan Act of 1871, placing reaction to the Klan under jurisdiction of federal troops and federal court.
April 13, 1873: The Colfax massacre—at least 105 black state militia members killed by members of the White League and the Ku Klux Klan in Colfax, LA.
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1913: The Irish Volunteers form—a group dedicated “to secure and maintain the rights and liberties common to the whole people of Ireland.”
1915: Second Ku Klux Klan founded.
1919: The Irish Republican Army, also known as the Old IRA, evolve out of Irish Volunteers. During the Irish Civil War, the Old IRA often focus their attacks on police barracks.
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December 23, 1920: The Government of Ireland Act (also known as the Fourth Home Rule Act) partitions Ireland, dividing the nation into Northern Ireland, under direct British rule, and Southern Ireland, a Republic recognizing the crown in a manner similar to Canada and Australia.
June 28, 1922-May 24, 1923: The Irish Civil War, with approximately 1,500 dead.
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June 12, 1963: African-American civil rights activist Medgar Evers shot and killed in Mississippi. White Citizens’ Council and Ku Klux Klan member Byron De La Beckwith arrested and later (February 5, 1994) convicted of murder.
1964: Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) formed by the Arab League, with the mission of destroying the State of Israel.
June 21, 1964: The Mississippi Civil Rights Workers Murders—Ku Klux Klan members murdered three civil rights workers: James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner.
May 1966: The Ulster Volunteer force—a loyalist paramilitary group—formed in Northern Ireland.
October 20, 1967: Seven men convicted for the murders of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner—the first convictions in Mississippi for the killing of a civil rights worker.
August 12-14, 1969: Battle of the Bogside, between Catholic residents, a Protestant group, and the police in Derry, Ireland.
December 1969: Irish Republican Army split into the Provisional IRA and the Official IRA, a clandestine arm of the Sinn Fein political movement devoted to removing British forces from Northern Ireland and unifying the country.
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1970: Palestinian militant group Black September formed as a branch of the Palestinian Liberation Organization, with the goal of destroying Israel.
December 1971: The IRA kills Irish Senator John Barnhill.
July 21, 1972: Provisional IRA explodes 22 bombs in Belfast area. In 1972, nearly 500 persons killed in violence in Northern Ireland.
January 30, 1972: Bloody Sunday, as a British parachute regiment shoots 26 civil rights protestors in Derry, Northern Ireland.
February 22, 1972: The Aldershot Bombing—the IRA bombs the headquarters of the parachute regiment involved in Bloody Sunday. Seven people killed, including a gardener, cleaning staff, and an army priest.
May 29, 1972: Lod Airport Massacre—three members of the Japanese Red Army open fire at Lod Airport in Tel Aviv, Israel, killing 26 and injuring 80 in support of Palestinian extremists.
September 5, 1972: The Munich Massacre—members of Palestinian organization Black September take members of the Israeli Olympic team hostage, demanding release of Palestinian prisoners in Israel. Eleven athletes killed.
May 17, 1974: The Dublin and Monoghan Bombings—car bombings by the Ulster Volunteer Force kill more than 30 people in Northern Ireland.
July 4, 1976: Entebbe Rescue Operation—Israeli Defense Force rescuers free 246 Air France Flight 139 passengers held hostage by two Palestinian and two German hijackers in Uganda.
May 25, 1978: First pipe bomb sent by mail to Northwestern University professor by Theodore Kaczynski, beginning Kaczynski’s terror campaign against modern technology.
November 4, 1979: Fifty-two Americans taken hostage at American Embassy in Tehran, Iran, by students of radical Islam.
November 15, 1979: Bomb built by Theodore Kaczynski explodes in and American Airlines flight, forcing the jet to land at Dulles International Airport near Washington, DC.
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Early 1980s: Jemaah Islamiyah organization founded in Indonesia by Abdullah Sungkar and Abu Bakar Ba’asyir, with mission of forming an Islamic State in Southeast Asia.
June 10, 1980: United Airlines President Percy Wood injured by exploding package in Lake Forest, IL. “Unabomber” acronym created by FBI based on Theodore Kaczynski targets, “UNiversities and Airline BOMbings.”
January 20, 1981: Fifty-two American hostages in Tehran, Iran, released after 444 days in captivity.
July 2, 1982: Unabomber pipe bomb severely injures engineering professor in Berkley, CA faculty lounge.
September 29-October 1, 1982: Seven people in Chicago area die of cyanide poisoning after taking Extra-Strength Tylenol capsules.
April 18, 1983: Suicide bomber in a pickup truck rammed the United States Embassy in Beirut, Lebanon, killing 63, including CIA chief Middle East Analyst Robert C. Ames. Reagan administration claimed Hezbollah was responsible.
October 23, 1983: Suicide bomber detonated a truck filled with explosives at U.S. Marine barracks at Beirut International Airport, killing 241 marines, wounding more than 100.
June 14, 1985: TWA flight 847 en route from Athens, Greece, to Rome, forced to land in Beirut, Lebanon. Hostage Robert Dean Stetham shot and killed. U.S. sources implicated Hezbollah, including Imad Mughniyah, who remains at large.
October 7, 1985: Achille Lauro hijacking—four members of the Palestine Liberation Front hijack the luxury liner near Egypt, demanding release of Palestinians in Israeli prisons, and killing an American in a wheelchair.
December 11, 1985: In, Sacramento, CA, computer store owner Hugh Scrutton becomes first death in Unabomber terrorist bombings.
1988: Charter published by Hamas, a Palestinian militant movement that evolved in Gaza out of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood.
1988: As Soviet troops leave Afghanistan, Al-Quaeda founded by Osama Bin Laden, recruiting Arab fighters from the U.S.-backed Mujihideen movement, seeking holy wars to fight.
December 1, 1988: Pan Am flight 103 from London to New York exploded over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 259 on board and 11 on the ground. Said by State Department to be “an action authorized by the Libyan government.”
July 9, 1989: During the Hajj, two bombs explode near Grand Mosque in Mecca, killing one and injuring 16.
July 6, 1989: The Tel Aviv-Jerusalem Bus Massacre—member of the Palestinian Islamic Jihad drives a crowded bus over a precipice, killing 14. Considered the first suicide attack inside Israel.
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July 2, 1990: During the Hajj, stampede in pedestrian tunnel kills 1,426 pilgrims.
August 2, 1990: The Gulf War (also known as Operation: Desert Storm)—the United States and a coalition of nations launch this war in Iraq in response to Iraqi invasion of U.S. ally Kuwait.
March 1, 1991: Operation: Desert Storm ends.
February 26, 1993: Group led by Ramzi Yousef detonated a 500 kilogram bomb at the New York World Trade Center, killing six and injuring more than 1,000.
February 28, 1993: The Waco Davidian Standoff began when the Branch Davidian Compound in Waco, TX, raided by the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms under suspicion of illegal possession of firearms. Between the initial raid and the fire on April 19, four ATF agents and 85 Davidians killed.
March 10, 1993: Dr. David Gunn, founder of Pensacola (FL) Women’s Medical Services, shot and killed by anti-abortion extremist Michael Griffin. First murder of an abortion provider in the United States.
April 16, 1993: First Hamas suicide bombing at Mehola in the West Bank, killing one Israeli.
July 30, 1994: Dr. John Bayard Britton and escort Lt. Col. James Barrett killed at Ladies Center in Pensacola, FL, by Paul Jennings Hill, a minister and anti-abortion activist.
June 1993: First Unabomber letter sent to The New York Times.
October 1994: Ulster Volunteer Force agrees to a cease-fire.
October 19, 1994: Palestinian bombing on a bus in Tel Aviv. Killing 22 (plus the terrorist), this is the first major suicide bombing in Tel Aviv.
December 10, 1994: Unabomber explosive kills advertising executive in New Jersey.
December 30, 1994: John C. Salvi III shoots two women and wounds five in attacks on two abortion clinics in Brookline, MA.
April 19, 1995: Oklahoma City Bombing of the Murrah Federal Building, carried out by Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, killing 168 persons, reportedly as a protest over the Waco Standoff.
April 24, 1995: Final Unabomber bombing kills timber industry lobbyist in Sacramento, CA.
April 3, 1996: Unabomber Theodore Kaczynski arrested at mountain cabin in Montana.
June 15, 1996: The Manchester Bombing—largest bomb attack in England since World War II.
June 25, 1996: Nineteen Americans killed in bombing at a military housing complex near Dhahran, Saudi Arabia, blamed on militant Hezbollah group, with suspected Al-Qaeda involvement.
July 27, 1996: Pipe bomb explodes at Centennial Olympic Park in Atlanta, GA, during the Olympic Games, killing one and injuring more than 100. Anti-gay anti-abortion extremist Eric Robert Rudolph later convicted.
January 16, 1997: Eric Robert Rudolph bombs abortion clinic in Sandy Springs, GA. Bomb made of dynamite, surrounded by nails.
February 21, 1997: Eric Robert Rudolph bombs gay nightclub in Atlanta, GA.
July 19, 1997: Irish Republican Army declares cease-fire, effective July 20.
January 29, 1998: Eric Robert Rudolph bombs abortion clinic in Birmingham, AL, killing a police officer and injuring a nurse.
February 22, 1998: Osama Bin Laden issues a “fatwa” calling for attacks on United States citizens.
April 10, 1998: The Good Friday Agreement, also called the Belfast Agreement, signed by the British and Irish governments, establishes structure for peace in Northern Ireland.
August 7, 1998: Truck bombs kill more than 220 at United States embassies in Kenya and Tanzania. Osama Bin Laden later indicted by a U.S. court for the attacks.
September 1999: Chechen separatists opposing Russian rule of Chechnya kill 64 in the bombing of a Moscow apartment building.
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October 12, 2000: Two suicide bombers ram a boat into warship U.S.S. Cole in Yemen, killing 17 American sailors.
September 11, 2001: Nineteen Al-Qaeda terrorists hijack four airliners in attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, destroying the twin towers of the Trade Center.
September 18, 2001: Letters containing anthrax mailed to ABC News, NBC News, CBS News and New York Post newspaper, all in New York, and to American Media, Inc. in Boca Raton, FL. Envelopes bear a Trenton, NJ postmark.
October 5, 2001: Robert Stevens, employed by American Media, Inc. in Boca Raton, FL, dies of exposure to anthrax letter postmarked September 18.
October 7, 2001: United States and allies launch war in Afghanistan, in response to Al-Qaeda attacks on the United States.
October 9, 2001: Letters containing anthrax (more refined than September 18 letters), bearing a Trenton, NJ postmark, sent to Democratic Senators Tom Daschle and Patrick Leahy.
October 15, 2001: Anthrax letter sent to Senator Tom Daschle is opened, government mail service shut down.
December 23, 2001: British citizen Richard Reid unsuccessfully tries to destroy flight from Paris to Miami with a shoe bomb.
March 27, 2002: Passover Massacre in Netyanya, Israel, as suicide bomber associated with Hamas kills 30 and injures more than 100.
October 12, 2002: Two bombs detonated in Kuta, Bali, killing 202 people, including 164 foreign nationals—mostly tourists. Members of Islamist group Jemaah Islamiyah later convicted for bombings.
October 23, 2002: Chechen separatists sent by Islamic radical Shamil Basayev seize Moscow theater. Gas used to end the siege kills more than 120 of the 700 hostages.
March 20, 2003: United States and allies launch war in Iraq.
May 12, 2003: Riyadh compound bombings in Saudi Arabia target the Dorrat Al Jadawel, Al Hamra Oasis Village, and Vinnell Corporation compounds—all with American connections, killing 35 and wounding 160.
May 16, 2003: Five suicide bombings in Casablanca, Morocco, kill 45. Attributed to North African terrorist group Salafia Jihadia.
September 3, 2003: Paul Jennings Hill executed by lethal injection for killing of abortion provider Dr. John Bayard Britton and escort Lt. Col. James Barrett in Pensacola, FL.
October 4, 2003: A 28-year-old Palestinian woman associated with the Islamic Jihad kills herself in Maxim restaurant in Haifa, Israel, killing 21 Israelis, Jews, and Arabs. Restaurant co-owned by Jewish and Arab partners.
December 20, 2003: British Consulate and HSBC Bank in Istanbul, Turkey bombed, killing 27 and wounding 450. Two groups connected to Al-Qaeda claim responsibility.
February 1, 2004: Two suicide bombings against Kurdish political parties kill 56 and wound 200 in Irbil, Iraq.
March 11, 2004: Ten bombs explode on four commuter trains in Madrid, Spain, killing 191 and injuring 1,800. Investigations focus on the Moroccan Islamic Combatant Group.
May 29-30, 2004: The Khobar Siege in Saudi Arabia—gunmen attack offices in Khobar, killing 22, and then hold hostages in a housing complex until Saudi commandos storm the complex.
May 31, 2003: Terrorist bomber Eric Robert Rudolph arrested in western North Carolina.
July 12, 2004: Arab militia, supported by the Islamic government, raid the Sudanese village of Donki Dereisa and kill approximately 150 civilians, including six children who are burned alive.
September 1, 2004: Thirty-two Islamic militants associated with Chechen separatists attack a school in Beslan, Russia, killing more than 300 people—mostly children—in a three day siege. All but one of the militants are killed.
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July 7, 2005: Fifty-two people killed and 700 injured in central London by bombs on three Underground (subway) trains and one bus.
June 21, 2005: Baptist minister and Ku Klux Klan member Edgar Ray Killen sentenced for the 1964 murders of James Chaney, Andrew Goodman, and Michael Schwerner.
September 30, 2005: In Darfur, Janjaweed militia attack a camp for displaced persons, killing about 30.
October 2, 2005: Terrorist bombs kill 26 (including three bombers with suspected links to Al-Qaeda) and wound 102 in two resort spots in Jimbaran Bay and Kuta, Bali.
January 2006: Palestinian organization Hamas wins Palestinian Authority general legislative election.
January 16, 2006: Bombers kill 26 in two suicide attacks in Kandahar Province, Afghanistan.
February 22, 2006: Sunni insurgents bomb Shiite Askariya Shrine in Samarra, Iraq.
March 12, 2006: Six car bombs explode in Shiite sections of Baghdad, Iraq, killing nearly 50 and wounding approximately 200.
June 8, 2006: Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, killed by United States air strike in Iraq.
June 9, 2006: Hamas ends cease fire between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.
July 1, 2006: Sixty-six killed in suicide bombing in Baghdad market.
July 10, 2006: Islamic militant Shamil Basayev, a leader of the Chechen separatists, killed in neighboring Ingushetia.
November 23, 2006: Five car bombs and one mortar shell kill more than 200 people in Sadr City section of Baghdad.
December 30, 2006: Saddam Hussein hanged in Baghdad.
February 20, 2007: Tanker carrying chlorine explodes in Taji, Iraq, killing six and poisoning approximately 150 with toxic gas.
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