Biological warfare in the context of "Water supply terrorism"

A weapon, arm, or armament is any implement or device that is used to deter, threaten, inflict physical damage, harm, or kill. Weapons are used to increase the efficacy and efficiency of activities such as hunting, crime (e.g., murder), law enforcement, self-defense, warfare, or suicide. In a broader context, weapons may be construed to include anything used to gain a tactical, strategic, material, or mental advantage over an adversary or enemy target.

While ordinary objects such as rocks and bottles can be used as weapons, many objects are expressly designed for the purpose; these range from simple implements such as clubs and swords to complicated modern firearms, tanks, missiles and biological weapons. Something that has been repurposed, converted, or enhanced to become a weapon of war is termed weaponized, such as a weaponized virus or weaponized laser.

The Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) is both a defense agency and a combat support agency within the United States Department of Defense (DoD) for countering weapons of mass destruction (WMD; chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and high explosives) and supporting the nuclear enterprise. Its stated mission is to provide "cross-cutting solutions to enable the Department of Defense, the United States Government, and international partners to Deter strategic attack against the United States and its allies; Prevent, reduce, and counter WMD and emerging threats; and Prevail against WMD-armed adversaries in crisis and conflict." DTRA is headquartered in Fort Belvoir, Virginia. The DTRA mission, organization and management, responsibilities and functions, relationships, authorities, and administration are defined in DoD Directive 5105.62, Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA).

Human extinction or omnicide is the end of the human species, either by population decline due to extraneous natural causes, such as an asteroid impact or large-scale volcanism, or via anthropogenic destruction (self-extinction).

Some of the many possible contributors to anthropogenic hazards are climate change, global nuclear annihilation, biological warfare, weapons of mass destruction, and ecological collapse. Other scenarios center on emerging technologies, such as advanced artificial intelligence, biotechnology, or self-replicating nanobots.

In the 1948 Palestine war, more than 700,000 Palestinian Arabs – about half of Mandatory Palestine's predominantly Arab population – were expelled or fled from their homes. Expulsions and attacks against Palestinians were carried out by the Zionist paramilitaries Haganah, Irgun, and Lehi, which merged to become the Israel Defense Forces after the establishment of Israel part way through the war. The expulsion and flight was a central component of the fracturing, dispossession, and displacement of Palestinian society, known as the Nakba. Dozens of massacres targeting Arabs were conducted by Israeli military forces and between 400 and 600 Palestinian villages were destroyed. Village wells were poisoned in a biological warfare programme, properties were looted to prevent Palestinian refugees from returning, and some sites were subject to Hebraization of Palestinian place names.

The precise number of Palestinian refugees, many of whom settled in Palestinian refugee camps in neighboring states, is a matter of dispute, although the number is around 700,000, being approximately 80 percent of the Arab inhabitants of what became Israel. About 250,000–300,000 Palestinians fled or were expelled during the 1947–1948 civil war in Mandatory Palestine, before the termination of the British Mandate on 14 May 1948. The desire to prevent the collapse of the Palestinians and to avoid more refugees were some of the reasons for the entry of the Arab League into the country, which began the 1948 Arab–Israeli War.

The Nakba (Arabic: النَّكْبَة, romanized: an-Nakba, lit. 'the catastrophe') is the Israeli ethnic cleansing of Palestinian Arabs through their violent displacement and dispossession of land, property, and belongings, along with the destruction of their society and the suppression of their culture, identity, political rights, and national aspirations. The term is used to describe the events of the 1948 Palestine war in Mandatory Palestine as well as Israel's ongoing persecution and displacement of Palestinians. As a whole, it covers the fracturing of Palestinian society and the longstanding rejection of the right of return for Palestinian refugees and their descendants.

During the foundational events of the Nakba in 1948, about half of Palestine's predominantly Arab population – around 750,000 people – were expelled from their homes or made to flee through various violent means, at first by Zionist paramilitaries, and after the establishment of the State of Israel, by its military. Dozens of massacres targeted Palestinian Arabs, and over 500 Arab-majority towns, villages, and urban neighborhoods were depopulated. Many of the settlements were either completely destroyed or repopulated by Jews and given new Hebrew names. Israel employed biological warfare against Palestinians by poisoning village wells. By the end of the war, Israel controlled 78% of the land area of the former Mandatory Palestine.

Gabriel de Mussis (Italian: Gabriele de' Mussi; c. 1280 – c. 1356) was a notary from Piacenza, Italy, who gave a vivid account of the start of the Black Death in the Black Sea city of Kaffa and its spread to Sicily and Piacenza. His account in Latin, entitled Istoria de Morbo sive Mortalitate quae fuit Anno Dni MCCCXLVIII ("History of the Disease, or the Great Dying that took place in the Year of our Lord 1348"), is preserved in a manuscript in the library of the University of Wroclaw (now shelfmark R 262).

Although it was formerly believed that de Mussis had been present in Kaffa and travelled in a disease-laden ship to Piacenza, it has been determined that he probably never left home. De Mussis apparently recorded an early example of biological warfare in describing how the army of the Golden Horde hurled plague-infected cadavers over the city walls during the Siege of Caffa in 1346. Modern authorities believe that his description of events is plausible and may indicate that plague was successfully introduced into Kaffa by the Tartars, but that the long-standing belief that the events at Kaffa contributed to the spread of plague beyond the city is not correct. Some scholars such as Jean Paul Zanders however believe that the story of the attack as exaggerated due to factors such as De Mussis only hearing of the attack from others and the limitations of trebuchet capabilities.

Bioterrorism is terrorism involving the intentional release or dissemination of biological agents. These agents include bacteria, viruses, insects, fungi, and/or their toxins, and may be in a naturally occurring or a human-modified form, in much the same way as in biological warfare. Further, modern agribusiness is vulnerable to anti-agricultural attacks by terrorists, and such attacks can seriously damage economy as well as consumer confidence. The latter destructive activity is called agrobioterrorism and is a subtype of agro-terrorism.