This is a timeline of incidents in 1996 that have been labelled as "terrorism" and are not believed to have been carried out by a government or its forces (see state terrorism and state-sponsored terrorism).
| Date | Type | Dead | Injured | Location | Details | Perpetrators | Part of | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 9-18 January | Hostage-taking | 200+ | Dagestan, Russia | Kizlyar-Pervomayskoye hostage crisis Around 200 Chechen rebels raided an air base near Kizlyar and took thousands of civilians hostage. The events concluded in a battle between the Chechens and Russian Army in the village of Pervomayskoye that resulted in the deaths of around 200 Russian soldiers, 96 Chechen rebels and at least 26 civilians. | CRI | First Chechen War | ||
| 16-19 January | Hostage-taking | 0 | 13 | Black Sea | Black Sea hostage crisis Chechen rebels took over the ferry MV Avrasya and held the 232 passengers and crew hostage for 3 days before releasing them. | CRI | First Chechen War | |
| 31 January | Suicide bombing | 91 | 1400 | Colombo, Sri Lanka | Central Bank bombing An attack by the LTTE on the Central Bank killed 91 and injured a further 1,400 civilians, damaging other buildings in the process. It was the most deadly LTTE attack on a civilian target in the history of the group's operations.[1] | LTTE | Sri Lankan Civil War | |
| 9 February | Truck bombing | 2 | 200 | London, United Kingdom | 1996 Docklands bombing The Provisional Irish Republican Army detonated a massive truck bomb in the Canary Wharf financial district. | PIRA | The Troubles | |
| 14 March | Firebombing | 7 | ? | Sitra, Bahrain | 1996 Sitra attack Five terrorists throw petrol bombs into a restaurant, killing seven Bangladeshi workers. | DFLP | 1990s uprising in Bahrain | |
| 16 April | Ambush | 53-100 | Dozens | Yaryshmardy, Russia | Shatoy ambush Chechen rebels led by Ibn al-Khattab ambushed and massacres a battalion of Russian soldiers. | CRI | First Chechen War | |
| 18 April | Mass shooting | 18 | Cairo, Egypt | 1996 Cairo shooting 18 people were killed when Islamist gunmen fired on Greek tourists outside the Europa hotel.[2] | Islamists | |||
| 15 June | Van bombing | 0 | 212 | Manchester, United Kingdom | 1996 Manchester bombing The PIRA parked a van containing an enormous bomb in the city centre and phoned a warning to police. The bomb, the largest to explode in Britain since World War II, caused extensive damage. But despite injuring 212 people, the bomb did not kill anyone as the area had been evacuated, although a bomb squad failed to defuse the bomb. | PIRA | The Troubles | |
| 16 June | Massacre | 35-43 | Unknown | La Gabarra, Tibú, Colombia | La Gabarra massacre A massacre was perpetrated by members of the United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia (AUC paramilitary group) against alleged members of FARC, killing 35-43 people. | Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia | Colombian conflict | |
| 25 June | Truck bombing | 19 | 498 | Khobar, Saudi Arabia | Khobar Towers bombing A truck bombing targeting an apartment complex that housed U.S. servicemen. 19 American servicemen were killed and nearly 500 people of various nationalities were injured. | Saudi Hezbollah | ||
| 30 June | Bombing | 9 (+1) | 29 | Tunceli Province, Turkey | The 1996 Tunceli bombing was a suicide bombing targeting a group of 60 unarmed military personnel at a flag raising ceremony. | Kurdistan Workers' Party | Kurdish–Turkish conflict (1978–present) | |
| 4 July | Suicide bombing, assassination | 20+ | 60 | Jaffna, Sri Lanka | Ananda Hamangoda#LTTE suicide bombing At least 20 people, including Brigade 51-2 Commanding Officer Ananda Hamangoda, were killed in a suicide bombing. | LTTE | Sri Lankan Civil War | |
| 24 July | Bombing | 64 | 400 | Dehiwala, Sri Lanka | 1996 Dehiwala train bombing The LTTE detonated 4 bombs on Colombo-Alutgama train, killing 64 civilians and injuring 400 others. | LTTE | Sri Lankan Civil War | |
| 27 July | Bombing | 2 | 111 | Atlanta, United States | Centennial Olympic Park bombing Army of God member Eric Robert Rudolph detonated a pipe bomb at Centennial Olympic Park to try to cancel the 1996 Summer Olympics due to his anger at the U.S. government allowing abortion. | Eric Robert Rudolph AOG | ||
| 10 November | Bombing | 13 | 30 | Moscow, Russia | Kotlyakovskoya Cemetery bombing A bomb exploded at a cemetery during a funeral for the president of the Soviet-Afghan war veterans group who had been murdered. The group had ties to organized crime. The assailants were two former members of the group who had formed a splinter group. | Andrei Anohin Mikhail Smurov | ||
| 3 December | Bombing | 4 | 170 | Paris, France | 1996 Paris Métro bombing A bomb exploded at the Port-Royal-des-Champs Abbey metro station. | GIA | Algerian Civil War | |
| 17 December | Massacre, invasion | 7 | 1 | Novye Atagi, Russia | ICRC Hospital of Novye Atagi#The massacre Five to ten Chechen separatists broke into an ICRC hospital and murdered 6 six nurses and an engineer, all foreign nationals. The head of the hospital was seriously wounded. | CRI | First Chechen War | |
| 30 December | Bombing | 33+ | Western Assam, India | Brahmaputra Mail train bombing Assamese nationalists bombed a Brahmaputra Mail train. The railway the train was on was also used by military trains, which may have been the militants targets. | NDFB | Assam conflict |