by Nanette Piotrowski

Created on: March 13, 2010   Last Updated: June 10, 2010

Most would think that terrorism is the purview of the male of the species. After all, most terrorists have been male. However, according to NBC.com and other news sources, there has been a female terrorist in prison since October of 2009.

Meet Jihad Jane; a blonde-haired, blue-eyed, forty-six year old, whose real name is Colleen LaRose. Who would think that a girl from the small town of Ennis, Texas would be recruiting terrorists over the Internet.

E-mails recovered by the FBI from her computer show that over a period of 15 months, she was hatching a plan to kill Swedish artist Lars Vilks. Vilks had depicted the Prophet Mohammed with the body of a dog, which caused quite a stir in the Muslim community.

LaRose agreed to become a martyr and kill Vilks or die trying. She thought because of her blond hair and blue eyes, she would be able to blend in and get close enough to him to complete the job. She had pledged to commit murder in the name of a Muslim Holy War.

She is only one of a half-dozen women to be accused of terrorism. Perhaps the most famous female terrorist was Leila Khaled. She was the head of the group called Black September. She was responsible for the hijacking of four airliners in the 1970s.

She was eventually caught but was released in exchange for a hostage swap. She now resides in the UK doing political lecture tours.

Was Jihad Janes hope to become as famous as Leila Khaled? No one knows for sure as she's not talking. Even her boyfriend did not suspect anything as she had never mentioned or discussed her views on terrorism, the war or the Muslim faith.

Colleen LaRose was captured in Philadelphia and is scheduled to appear in court on March 18th. She is charged with "trying to foment a terror conspiracy to kill someone overseas" and also for agreeing to provide financial help to her conspirators in Asia and Europe.

It will be interesting to find out who her attorney will be and what defense he/she will be able to come up with to try to get her out of this. She may well try a psychiatric defense or that she thought it was some sort of a game, since it was done over the Internet.

Male or female, terrorism is terrorism and just because LaRose is a female, should not ger her off the hook or a lighter sentence. The United States will not tolerate a terrorist regardless of gender.

Considering all terrorists are considered psychopaths, Colleen LaRose put herself into that category and must be punished to the full extent of the law.

Sources:

http://www.nbc.com

http://n.newsclicker.com

Learn more about this author, Nanette Piotrowski.
Click here to send this author comments or questions.