Suicide attack
attack in which the attacker knows they will die
A suicide attack (also known by a wide variety of other names, see below) is a deliberate attack in which the perpetrators intentionally end their own lives as part of the attack. These attacks are a form of murder–suicide that is often associated with terrorism or war. When the attackers are labelled as terrorists, the attacks are sometimes referred to as an act of suicide terrorism. Military use of suicide is not directly regulated by international law, but suicide attacks sometimes violate prohibitions against perfidy or targeting civilians. Suicide attacks have occurred in various contexts, ranging from military campaigns—such as the Japanese kamikaze pilots during World War II (1944–1945)—to more contemporary Islamic terrorist campaigns—including the September 11 attacks in 2001.
Suicide attacks have been used by a wide range of political ideologies, from far-right (Japan and Germany in WWII) to far-left (such as the PKK and JRA).
Definition and terminology
Kamikaze
Kamikaze was a term initially used for Japanese suicide pilots in World War II, but is occasionally used in other contexts.
For example, the 1972 Lod Airport massacre in Israel by the Japanese Red Army (JRA) was labelled by some reports at the time a "Kamikaze" attack, but others have criticized the label, including the surviving attacker's interpreter. The Kamikaze were a unit of suicide bombers of the Empire of Japan in WWII, which had a very different ideology to the JRA. Researchers from Duke University described the JRA's motives as "rooted in anti-imperialism, anti-colonialism, and anti-capitalism". In more recent reports the 1972 JRA attack on Lod airport is described in modern terms such as "suicide attack" and "suicide mission", even when referring to the attacker who survived.
The public source identifies “Suicide attack” as attack in which the attacker knows they will die. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Suicide, attack and attacker.
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A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Suicide attack”, the useful work is to connect “attack in which the attacker knows they will die” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.
Named sources, stable identifiers and responsible institutions provide the strongest route from overview to verifiable evidence. The source revision retrieved here is dated Sep 19, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q217327. The Library of Congress control number is sh2002007733. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1944, 1945, 2001 and 1972.
Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.
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This entry incorporates text from “Suicide attack” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.