Word: shahid
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Dates: during 2001-2001
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Islam lauds martyrdom. The traditions of Muhammad state that a shahid's sins will be forgiven when he sheds his first drop of blood, that he can admit 70 relatives to paradise and will himself be married there to 72 beautiful virgins, a point emphasized by Osama bin Laden. (Some authorities, however, feel that causing one's own death categorically disqualifies one as a martyr...
...developed a fairly well-defined profile of the typical suicidal terrorist. That man would be young, 18 to 24, born in poverty, a victim of some personal tragedy, a despairing zealot with nothing to lose. He would be fanatic in behavior and belief: stern, moralistic, teetotaling. The status of shahid, or holy martyr, would solve his earthly issues in paradise, and someone would give money to his family on earth. If he hailed from the rebel training camps of Afghanistan, where the cult of jihad gets its earthly gunmen, he would be fundamentalist in his faith, ignorant of the outside...