Word: martyrdom
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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MOHAMMED FARRAH AIDID can work the crowd as well as any politician. At a demonstration last week in Mogadishu against the U.S.-led air strikes, the United Nations' most-wanted man switched nimbly between martyrdom and angry defiance. Stretching his hands skyward, he led 1,000 clansmen in prayer, urging them to take comfort in Islam. "The U.N. and the U.S. are trying to impose colonial rule on us," he said. "God will destroy Washington as surely as they have destroyed Mogadishu...
...spin. David Koresh's attorneys talked about contesting some government assertions -- in court -- and described in detail a surrender scheduled after the group's Passover. Koresh also deputized two New York City lawyers to handle his book, television and movie rights, hardly the act of a man contemplating martyrdom...
...known to be a sanctuary for extremists. Hundreds of fundamentalists were arrested. Still, the antigovernment attacks continue. Authorities now worry about the proliferation of small terrorist groups; diplomats fret about ham-fisted tactics. "The danger," warns an envoy, "is that fundamentalists may attain a level of faith that invites martyrdom...
...simple message: "If the Bible is true, then I'm Christ." It was enough to draw more than a hundred people to join him at an armed fortress near Waco, Texas, to await the end of the world. The same message tempted Koresh to entertain a vision of martyrdom for himself. He would die in a battle against unbelievers, then be joined in heaven by the followers who chose to lay down their lives...
Middle-class, full-time motherhood is too often imbued with martyrdom and angst-ridden soul searching, usually a feverish attempt to justify the retreat to domesticity. This retreat may be facilitated by the fact that women do face particular problems in the corporate world...