If the oil-rich nations in the middle east ever had democratic rule, their governments would quickly move away from their official and unofficial alliances and partnerships with the United States and Israel, and would in all likelihood form their own powerful bloc in support of their own interests. Because the empire helps suppress the will of the people in that region by installing and supporting dictators instead, the only recourse some people feel they have to see their will enacted in that direction is the non-state violence known as “terrorism”.