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Bloodstained Holidays: Why Does Terror Strike During Festive Seasons?
A member of the National Guard Military Police stands, in the area where people were killed by a man driving a truck in an attack during New Year’s celebrations, in New Orleans, Louisiana, US, Jan. 2, 2025. PHoto: REUTERS/Octavio Jones
On New Year’s Day 2025, a horrific vehicular attack in New Orleans claimed the lives of 15 and injured at least 35. This heinous act, carried out by a lone terrorist, shocked the city’s residents and the world at large. New Orleans, renowned for its vibrant nightlife and as a cradle of jazz and blues music, now mourns the loss of its people. This tragedy adds to a grim series of deadly terrorist attacks that have become alarmingly common during the Christmas and New Year’s season.
In recent years, holiday-season terror attacks have become a global phenomenon. In 2015, a mass shooting in San Bernardino, California, left 14 dead at the hands of an ISIS-inspired couple. The timing during the holiday season magnified the attack’s symbolic resonance. The assailants were apprehended within hours. In 2016, a terror attack at a Christmas market in Berlin sent shockwaves across the globe. Anis Amri, a Tunisian national and ISIS operative, drove a truck into the market, killing 12 and injuring dozens. The attack targeted not just innocent civilians, but also one of the most iconic symbols of Christmas – the holiday markets. Similarly, in 2018, a gunman opened fire at a Christmas market in Strasbourg, France, killing five and injuring many others.
These attacks are far from random; they reflect a profound hostility toward the values and symbols of Western culture. Christmas symbols – the tree, Santa Claus, the Star of Bethlehem – are viewed by jihadist terrorists as representations of Christian-Western culture, which they consider an enemy to be eradicated. The festive crowds, dazzling decorations, and capitalist atmosphere of the season provoke these extremists and fuel their violent motivations.
Jihadists often draw inspiration from religious texts, including verses in the Quran emphasizing the struggle against unbelievers. For example, Surah 9:29 states: “Fight those who do not believe in Allah… and do not forbid what Allah and His Messenger have forbidden… until they give the jizya willingly while they are humbled.” This verse, which underscores armed struggle and Islamic supremacy, is used as a religious justification for such attacks. Other verses, depicting disdain for non-believers, provide the ideological framework for their actions.
The link between Christmas and New Year’s holidays and acts of terror is not limited to Western countries. In Israel, this connection also manifests in disturbing ways. Just a week ago, Sheikh Raed Salah delivered a sermon in an Israeli mosque that included blatant incitement against Jews.
Interpreting Islamic eschatological visions, Salah described Jesus as one who foretold the coming of Muhammad and claimed, “Allah raised Jesus alive after the wicked (Jews) conspired to kill him.” The sermon further attacked “the deceitful Western leaders,” accusing them of supporting Israel while blaming them for the suffering in Gaza, thus portraying the Western world as complicit in Palestinian suffering.
Incitement and acts of terror during Christmas and New Year’s highlight the extreme expression of inter-religious conflict between the capitalist Western world and radical Islamic ideologies. This conflict is ideological and cultural, not merely a security challenge. Christmas symbols, embodying culture, liberty, and universality, are seen as a threat to the core tenets of extremist religious traditions. The Western world must prepare not only in terms of security but also by intensifying its cultural and ideological response. Promoting tolerance, interfaith dialogue, and strengthening its identity are crucial to countering these threats.
During this festive season, as we also celebrated Hanukkah – a festival of light and the pursuit of freedom, commemorating our victory against Hellenistic forces attempting to impose foreign culture upon us – it is vital to deepen our understanding of this struggle. Addressing these threats requires a multifaceted approach that encompasses military, cultural, and ideological efforts to confront the challenges posed by radical terrorism.
Itamar Tzur is an Israeli scholar and Middle East expert who holds a Bachelor’s degree with honors in Jewish History and a Master’s degree with honors in Middle Eastern Studies. As a senior member of the “Forum Kedem for Middle Eastern Studies and Public Diplomacy.” Tzur leverages his academic expertise to enhance understanding of regional dynamics and historical contexts within the Middle East.
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Smotrich Says Defense Ministry to Spur Voluntary Emigration from Gaza
Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich attends an inauguration event for Israel’s new light rail line for the Tel Aviv metropolitan area, in Petah Tikva, Israel, Aug. 17, 2023. Photo: REUTERS/Amir Cohen
i24 News – Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich said on Sunday that the government would establish an administration to encourage the voluntary migration of Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.
“We are establishing a migration administration, we are preparing for this under the leadership of the Prime Minister [Benjamin Netanyahu] and Defense Minister [Israel Katz],” he said at a Land of Israel Caucus at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament. “The budget will not be an obstacle.”
Referring to the plan championed by US President Donald Trump, Smotrich noted the “profound and deep hatred towards Israel” in Gaza, adding that “sources in the American government” agreed “that it’s impossible for two million people with hatred towards Israel to remain at a stone’s throw from the border.”
The administration would be under the Defense Ministry, with the goal of facilitating Trump’s plan to build a “Riviera of the Middle East” and the relocation of hundreds of thousands of Gazans for rebuilding efforts.
“If we remove 5,000 a day, it will take a year,” Smotrich said. “The logistics are complex because you need to know who is going to which country. It’s a potential for historical change.”
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Defense Ministry: 16,000 Wounded in War, About Half Under 30
A general view shows the plenum at the Knesset, Israel’s parliament, in Jerusalem. Photo: REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – The Knesset’s (Israeli parliament’s) Special Committee for Foreign Workers held a discussion on Sunday to examine the needs of wounded and disabled IDF soldiers and the response foreign caregivers could provide.
During the discussion, data from the Defense Minister revealed that the number of registered IDF wounded and disabled veterans rose from 62,000 to 78,000 since the war began on October 7, 2023. “Most of them are reservists and 51 percent of the wounded are up to 30 years old,” the ministry’s report said. The number will increase, the ministry assesses, as post-trauma cases emerge.
The committee chairwoman, Knesset member Etty Atiya (Likud), emphasized the need to reduce unnecessary bureaucracy for the wounded and to remove obstacles. “There is no dispute that the IDF disabled have sacrificed their bodies and souls for the people of Israel, for the state of Israel,” she said. Addressing the veterans, she continued: “And we, as public representatives and public servants alike, must do everything, but everything, to improve your lives in any way possible, to alleviate your pain and the distress of your family members who are no less affected than you.”
Currently, extensions are being given to the IDF veterans on a three-month basis, which Atiya said creates uncertainty and fear among the patients.
“The committee calls on the Interior Minister [Moshe Arbel] to approve as soon as possible the temporary order on our table, so that it will reach the approval of the Knesset,” she said, adding that she “intends to personally approach the Director General of the Population Authority [Shlomo Mor-Yosef] on the matter in order to promote a quick and stable solution.”
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Over 1,300 Killed in Syria as New Regime Accused of Massacring Civilians
Syria’s President Bashar al-Assad speaks during an interview with Sky News Arabia in Damascus, Syria in this handout picture released by the Syrian Presidency on August 8, 2023. Syrian Presidency/Handout via REUTERS
i24 News – Over 1,300 people were killed in two days of fighting in Syria between security forces under the new Syrian Islamist leaders and fighters from ousted president Bashar al-Assad’s Alawite sect on the other hand, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights on Sunday.
Since Thursday, 1,311 people had been killed, according to the Observatory, including 830 civilians, mainly Alawites, 231 Syrian government security personnel, and 250 Assad loyalists.
The intense fighting broke out late last week as the Alawite militias launched an offensive against the new government’s fighters in the coastal region of the country, prompting a massive deployment ordered by new leader Ahmed al-Sharaa.
“We must preserve national unity and civil peace as much as possible and… we will be able to live together in this country,” al-Sharaa said, as quoted in the BBC.
The death toll represents the most severe escalations since Assad was ousted late last year, and is one of the most costly in terms of human lives since the civil war began in 2011.
The counter-offensive launched by al-Sharaa’s forces was marked by reported revenge killings and atrocities in the Latakia region, a stronghold of the Alawite minority in the country.
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