NETANYA, ISRAEL – We know that terrorist groups need attention: is this why two different organisations would claim the same bombing?
Popularity is a fickle thing. Just ask Dick Assman.
The Saskatchewan man gained fame on the David Letterman show in the mid-1990s for his unusual and rather humorous name and launched a phenomenon known as ‘Assmania’. I am NOT making this up.
Mr. Assman took the attention in good stride and even appeared on the show once. He died in 2016 and was still working as a mechanic at a gas station at the end. Fame had not destroyed him.
I am quite certain that terrorist groups would love the exposure appearing on the Letterman show would grant them. The whole point of terrorism is, after all, to gain notoriety. Or as a former Borealis podcast guest, Brian Jenkins, once put it, ‘terrorism is theatre.’
This need to be seen even leads multiple groups to claim the same terrorist attack on occasion.
On this day in 2002
A suicide bomber killed himself and three others, and wounded another 59, in the Israeli coastal city of Netanya. The bomber, who had disguised as an Israeli soldier, blew himself up at a market.
It was a very, very strong blast.
Shimon Genna, a butcher working in the market
In the immediate aftermath both Hamas and the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP) said their man was behind the attack. I guess the old saying is true: you cannot put a price tag on advertising.
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