A/HRC/4/26 page 20 world order the more likely people are to endorse suicide terrorism, while their economic status or levels of education are marginal determiners.55 Other researchers point in the opposite direction, observing that religious beliefs can both encourage and discourage suicide attacks.56 Some other researchers have explained the personal motivations behind the terrorist suicide bombings by the experience of childhood traumas, when children have experienced their fathers being humiliated by military personnel, or themselves being raped by State representatives, and not being able to direct their own action so that it could make the feeling of humiliation disappear. In these situations religious or quasi-religious martyrdom can be experienced as a chance to reclaim family honour.57 In such circumstances, recruitment of young future suicide bombers may become easy, as a perceived way out of the desperate position.58 72. According to available sources, a fairly large proportion, 15 to 30 per cent, of suicide bombers, are female. They are active in all organizations, even though in some organizations their status is contentious.59 Security measures which ignored women as potential terrorists have failed dramatically. One further challenge has been that female bombers often pretend to be pregnant: this makes them to look vulnerable and helps them to pass security checks.60 73. As with other counter-terrorism measures, preventive action and intelligence-gathering forms a significant part of States’ responses to terrorism. In the context of suicide bombings, the issue of a “sleeper” has gained considerable attention. The imagery of persons living just like anyone else, who are educated and well integrated into modern society, and who would suddenly transform into terrorists, has been broadly projected in the debate.61 These sleepers, 55 Ibid. 56 Diego Gambetta, ed., Making Sense of Suicide Missions, Oxford University Press, 2005. 57 Michael Bond, “The making of a suicide bomber”, New Scientist, 15 May 2004, quoted in Mia Bloom, “Mother.Sister.Daughter.Bomber: Why women become suicide bombers” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, November/December 2005, vol. 61, issue 6, pp. 54-62, here at p. 57. 58 Nasra Hassan writings, e.g. The New Yorker, 19 November 2001. 59 Mia Bloom, op. cit., footnote 57; Rosemarie Skaine, Female Suicide Bombers, McFarland, Jefferson, N.C., 2006; Julia Jusik, Die Bräute Allahs: Selbstmordattentäterinnen aus Tschetschenien, St. Pölten, 2005. 60 Audrey Kurth Cronin, “Terrorist and suicide attacks”, Congressional Research Service (CRS) Report for Congress, 28 August 2003 p. 12-15. 61 Sabina Magliocco, “The opposite of right society: Witches, terrorist and the discourse of evil”, in R. Bendix and J. Bendix, eds., Ethnologia Europaea, “Sleepers, moles and martyrs”, vol. 33:2, pp. 13-22, here p. 13; see also the discussion of the concept in Marianne Gullestad, “Mohammed Atta and I: Identification, discrimination and the formation of sleepers”, in European Journal of Cultural Studies, vol. 6 (4), 2003, pp. 529-548.