Ron E. Hassner

“To Halve and to Hold”: Conflicts over Sacred Space and the Problem of Indivisibility

A cooking time indication arrangement for use in a microwave oven which includes a rotary drum of light transmitting nature having a plurality of menus to be cooked imprinted on it, a timer scale and a pointer needle associated with a timer, and an illuminating lamp enclosed in the rotary drum. The drum is rotatably supported by bearings through end members provided at its opposite ends for smooth rotation, while the illuminating lamp having high vibration resistance is adjustably supported by a securing plate, and the menu indication on the drum being prevented from becoming wrinkled due to temperature variations.

The Path to Intractability: Time and the Entrenchment of Territorial Disputes

Why do territorial disputes become more difficult to resolve over time? Why are states often unable to resolve long-standing territorial disputes over land that is of little strategic or economic value? One explanation for territorial dispute entrenchment draws on changes in dispute perception. Specifically, as territorial disputes mature they undergo processes that increase the integrity of the disputed territory, clarify the definition of the territorys boundaries, and make it more difficult to find substitutes for the territory. Territorial dispute resolution is both stochastic and exogenous to the entrenchment process and thus impossible to predict. It is possible, however, to forecast ex ante the degree to which young territorial disputes are likely to resist resolution efforts in the future based on two variables: perceptions of a territorys integrity, boundaries, and value at the outset of the dispute, and physical constraints on expansion and settlement into the territory.

Sacred Time and Conflict Initiation

This article examines the manner in which rituals and symbols associated with sacred time have influenced conflict initiation. Leaders will time their attacks with sacred dates in the religious calendar if the force multiplying effects of sacred time, motivation, and vulnerability, outweigh its force dividing effects, constraint, and outrage. This is most likely to occur under three conditions: When conflict occurs across religious divides, when the sacred day is unambiguous in significance and meaning, and when rituals connected to that day will undermine an opponents’ military effectiveness. I illustrate these effects with twentieth century examples, including the timing of insurgent attacks in Iraq and the launching of the 1973 Arab-Israeli War. By exploring the pervasive effects of religious calendars on modern combat, I hope to redirect the focus of the study of religion and violence away from the narrow preoccupation with fundamentalism and terrorism and onto the much broader range of cases in which religion shapes secular conflict in multiple—and often unexpected—ways.

Fighting Insurgency on Sacred Ground

Iraqi insurgents are using their own mosques as operational bases, often forcing U.S. military commanders to choose between desecrating a sacred space or letting insurgents escape. Israel and India, along with experience from Iraq to date, offer four core lessons for how to respond.

Barriers to Entry: Who Builds Fortified Boundaries and Why?

Fortified boundaries are asymmetrical, physical barriers placed along borders. These boundaries are more formidable in structure than conventional boundary lines, but less robust than militarized boundaries. Their goal is to impose costs on infiltrators and in so doing deter or impede infiltration. A novel dataset of all such boundaries worldwide shows that states are constructing these barriers at an accelerating rate. More than half of barrier builders are Muslim-majority states, and so are the vast majority of targets. A multivariate analysis demonstrates that, contrary to conventional wisdom, states that construct such barriers do not tend to suffer disproportionately from terrorism, nor are they apt to be involved in a significant number of territorial disputes. Instead, differences in state wealth and migration rates are the best predictors of barrier construction. Qualitative case studies suggest that the most effective fortified boundaries are found where the initiating state controls the territory beyond a boundary that blocks the only access route into the state.

Religious Violence in Judaism: Past and Present

Throughout Jewish history, religious tradition has had a dialectical relationship with violence. Judaism is neither more nor less violent than any other religion. In this essay, however, we offer a comprehensive and integrated survey of the components of Jewish ethos and mythos relating to violence while analyzing and illustrating their development and influence over the course of three millennia, from biblical times to the contemporary Jewish world, particularly in the Jewish State. We analyze the various transformations that Jewish religious violent norms, values, moods, and symbols have undergone, their linkage to ever-changing social and cultural circumstances, their social-political roots and implications, and their relationship to other Jewish traditions. We trace how ancient violent motifs have emerged and have been processed over time, and observe present-day violent behavior in light of these motifs. Along the way, we explicate the dynamics that characterize the tradition of Jewish religious violence and its paradoxical nature. Our argument implies a general theoretical model of religious violence that can be applied in a comparative context: Actors engage in a constant evaluation, selection, and reinterpretation of religious ideas and practices from an ever-growing reservoir and in so doing contribute to that reservoir. Religious tradition is adaptable but it also places limits on the violence agents can justify at any point in time.

Debating the Role of Religion in War

Michael Horowitz’s compelling article deserves praise for pushing the agenda on religion and war beyond two contemporary obsessions: the axation on religion and nonstate violent actors, particularly insurgents and terrorists, and the emphasis on Islam as the primary religious movement associated with violent conoict.1 By examining how religion affected the duration of the Crusades, Horowitz persuasively demonstrates that religion has also shaped the behavior of conventional, Christian military forces. This is a step in the right direction, but it is an all-too-cautious step. Because Horowitz overemphasizes the narrow, causal effects of religion, at the expense of exploring the manifold ways in which religion can pervade and constitute all aspects of warfare, his argument suffers from endogeneity and missing variable bias. As I show below, these difaculties result in an argument that both overstates and obscures the primary effects of religion on war. Historical analyses such as these distract from what should be scholars’ primary concern regarding international security and religion: exploring the role of religion in contemporary interstate war.

Time and the Intractability of Territorial Disputes

what’s time got to do with it? Time seems integral to Hassner’s theory, creating intractable territorial disputes through three processes. First, conquered territory undergoes material entrenchment, as lines of transportation and communication link territory to the core of the state. Second, functional processes, such as mapping, make borders less ambiguous and less negotiable. Third, time creates symbolic attachments: as individuals aght, live, and die in conquered land, they construct myths to legitimate their territorial claims. Although Hassner’s arguments are intuitively plausible, it is unclear what effect time really has in his theory. Neither the duration of a territorial conoict nor a lack of settlement proves that disputes become more intractable over time. For example, territorial conoict could endure because initial conditions make it difacult to solve. Hassner claims that he controls for these conditions and that variables such as initial power and material value are unrelated to the conoict’s duration or resolution (p. 114 n. 19). But by his own account, it is initial perceptions of territorial value and cohesion that most affect the dispute’s entrenchment. If this is the case, it is not time but actors’ existing perceptions that make territorial disputes persist: conoict is not entrenched; it starts out as more difacult to solve. Hassner might respond that although initial perceptions explain variable rates of entrenchment, entrenchment occurs in all conoicts, even if the territory is initially perceived as worthless. Thus entrenchment is not reducible to initial conditions. This argument would be more convincing if Hassner provided evidence that disputes become intractable in the absence of initial perceptions. His two cases where initial perceptions of value are absent—Antarctica and the Spratly Islands—exhibit no entrench-

How to Cite a Sacred Text

Allusions to holy scriptures and quotes from sacred texts appear in hundreds of political science articles. Yet while we treat other ancient texts with reverence and diligence, we have not extended a similar care to the holy scriptures of the worlds religions. Political scientists often refer to biblical events, statements, and turns of phrase but rarely cite them, chapter and verse. They are careless about referencing the precise translation of the holy texts used, tend to cite religious passages out of context, and disregard the role of religious tradition, interpretation, and practice in shaping and reshaping the meaning of holy texts. I offer examples for these trends, provide evidence for their harmful implications and offer guidelines for the appropriate treatment of sacred texts as formal scholarly sources.

The Myth of the Ticking Bomb

“I have spoken as recently as 24 hours ago with people at the highest level of intelligence and I asked them the question ‘Does it work? Does torture work?’ And the answer was, ‘Yes, absolutely.’” These and similar statements in support of “enhanced interrogation” by President Donald Trump have revived the policy debate about the ethics of torture as a counterterrorism tool, amid concerns that the administration might roll back the Obama administration’s ban on torture. In these passionate debates, one argument has proven particularly influential: the ticking bomb argument. In this scenario, torture is justified because it is the only way to prevent an imminent mass terror attack. At Senate hearings, in internal government policy memoranda, in the memoirs of intelligence officials, in pundit editorials, and in Supreme Court cases, torture proponents have used the ticking bomb scenario to justify the forceful interrogation of terror suspects. Prior to 9/11, readers of English newspapers worldwide might have encountered references to “torture” paired with “ticking bomb” two or three times a year on average. Since 9/11, these references have multiplied roughly tenfold: “torture” and “ticking bomb” have appeared in the same article about three times a month. In parallel, the ticking bomb scenario has influenced interrogation policies at all levels of U.S. decision making. A 2005 memorandum from the Office of Legal Council to the CIA permitted waterboarding if the interrogation met ticking bomb conditions. In his nomination hearing to be director of the CIA in 2009, Leon Panetta listed the ticking bomb scenario as a factor in considering whether to employ torture. Seeking to justify the CIA’s enhanced interrogation program, Jose Rodriguez, former director of the CIA’s National Clandestine