Originally Posted by Eric5273
Ok...then we agree on this.
I just get annoyed when people throw the word terrorism out there for everything that they don't agree with. You have people calling attacks on US troops in Iraq terrorism when it is most certainly an attack on a foreign army (i.e. military target) in a hostile country that they invaded.
Correct, we agree on this point. This is standard guerilla warfare against a technologically and numerically superior army. However, we also know from multiple intel sources that these same insurgents have set off IEDs in crowded Baghdad marketplaces. So that would make them guerilla fighters on Monday and terrorists on Tuesday. So calling them 'terrorists' is still quite applicable as they have no qualms about switching back and forth between US forces and civilian targets.
You seem somewhat knowledgable, so I'm sure you probably know this, but I'll just add that history is not without a sense of irony with regard to Israel. Irgun and Lehi, the two Zionist groups that lead the fight for the state of Israel in the 1930s and 1940s were both terrorist groups and both waged campaigns of bombings and attacks of mostly civilians targets including passenger trains, buses, and the famous King David Hotel. Hundreds of civilians were killed over the 10-15 year period that these groups waged their war. Do you believe in Karma? (I don't, but certainly seems like it played a part here).
The problem is that INTENT can be manipulated. Osama bin Laden can tell the millions of people in Pakistan and Afghanistan that trust him that George Bush's INTENT is to kill all Muslims, thus making him a terrorist in their eyes. And Bush can tell the millions of Americans that trust him that Osama bin Laden's INTENT is to kill all Americans. Yet we all know (well, maybe not ALL of us) that neither statement is true. As civilians are almost always killed during a war, anyone's INTENT can be manipulated to look like terrorism.
That is why in criminal law you have a trial by jury. You are seeking to determine the end result of the alleged crime, the motive, and the intent. In a justice system setting you have the luxury of discovery, cross-examination, exhibits, testimony, witnesses, documents, etc. With international conflict, we do not have this luxury, at least not until the conflict is over and the responsible parties can potentially be brought in front an international war crimes body (which almost never happens). So this is where common sense has to enter the equation. Nobody has to "manipulate intent" for folks to see that flying a civilian jetliner onto an office building is a terrorist attack. Same with what happened in Mumbai's train stations and hotels. The "intent" does not need to be manipulated. It is clear as day for all to see (well, maybe not ALL).
Remember when Reagan used to call the Nicaraguan Contras "freedom fighters" in his speeches?? Did you ever read about the Contras? Over 30,000 civilians died from their attacks on civilian targets in a 5 year period. How many Israelis have died from Palestinean attacks in the past 5 years? Maybe 50? 100?
I'm sure it's more than 100. The Passover Massacre alone blew apart 30 Israelis, and the Dolphinarium nightclub massacre killed 21 teenagers. But granted, the number of Israelis killed is not in the thousands. I can assure you it's not for lack of trying on the part of Hamas and Islamic Jihad. The fact that suicide bombings in Israel have dropped off in the last 2 years is a testament to the combined security efforts of the IDF, Mossad, and Shin Bet. Those efforts have reached far and wide: targeted liquidation of terrorist leadership, large security barriers, extensive human intelligence in Gaza/West Bank, and the luck of having a political crack emerge between Hamas and the Palestinian Authority.
The Contras were surely the worst terrorist organization worldwide in the past 30 years. And our government supported them. Does that make the US a state sponsor of terror?
Last year in another thread on this board, this issue came up and I was told by someone that the Contras were not terrorists since they were fighting against a communist government. Apparently this person thinks terrorism is ok as long as their attacks on civilian targets are in a communist country.
The point I'm trying to make here is that these issues are never black and white like everyone in this thread is trying to paint them. We don't live in a mickey mouse world where every conflict is "good" vs. "evil". You need to realize that most situations fall somewhere in the middle, and rarely in a war is either side the "good guys". 99% of the time, both sides are at fault in some way or another. War is like a bar fight. If you get into a bar fight, I don't care if the other guy started, you are still an idiot.
And the point I am trying to make is that most folks on this forum and this thread are bright enough to appreciate "shades of grey", but are not so clouded in their moral compass as to try and justify terrorism, or pretend that lobbing rockets at Israeli population centers is not terrorism
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