The Prohibition Against the Training or Support of Terrorist Organizations Act of 1984

Abstract

The latest move by the Reagan administration in the campaign against what it calls terrorists and state-sponsored terrorism represents potentially one of the most anti-Arab initiatives US officials have recently devised. In drafting this new legislation, the administration has ignored its own Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) figures, showing a decline in terrorist incidents in the US; concealed a major terrorist bombing attempt at the US Congress by an Israeli citizen; and overridden objections to the terms of the new legislation by leading officials in the FBI and Congress. Following the October 1983 attack on the US Marine barracks in Beirut, the administration tried to divert public unhappiness with administration policy in Lebanon to condemnation of terrorists in general, and to Libya, Syria and Iran in particular as states sponsoring terrorist attacks. The Defense Department's commission of inquiry into the Beirut attack concluded in December that international terrorist acts endemic to the Middle East are indicative of an alarming world-wide phenomenon that poses an increasing threat to US personnel and facilities, and recommended an active national policy which seeks to deter attack or reduce its effectiveness.