Historical Threat and the Priming of Tribal Violence

Humans are naturally tribal and protective of the tribe. But our evolutionary genetics to protect and defend are especially acute and strengthened when real threats surround us. For Americans this was the attack on the World Trade Center, as well as ongoing gun violence in urban areas, mass casualty events, and increasing school shootings. For fundamentalist Muslims it is a sense that the West, and indeed more liberal Muslims, seek to undermine and destroy their way of life. For Russia, it has been a history of invading enemies from Napoleon to Nazi Germany. For Israel it is the sense that a history of persecution and a Holocaust must never occur again, and that they can only depend on themselves for their own defense. Similarly, a once safe-feeling Europe has experienced repeated terrorist attacks across France and in London. For Palestinians, what they call “the Nakba” (“the catastrophe”) is their story of Israel’s takeover of their land and the ongoing struggle of the Israeli Occupation.