Bakary:
While some of our views are beginning to converge, we still disagree on the
fundamental meaning of terrorism.  You equate almost everything under the sun
to this phenomenon, whereas I define it differently. A bit of research to
find the academically accepted version of this phenomenon unearthed the
following:

"Terrorism is an anxiety-inspiring method of repeated violent action,
employed by (semi-) clandestine individual, group or state actors, for
idiosyncratic, criminal or political reasons, whereby -- in contrast to
assassination -- the direct targets of violence are not the main targets. The
immediate human victims of violence are generally chosen randomly (targets of
opportunity) or selectively (representative or symbolic targets) from a
target population, and serve as message generators. Threat- and
violence-based communication processes between terrorist (organization),
(imperilled) victims, and main targets are used to manipulate the main target
(audience(s)), turning it into a target of terror, a target of demands, or a
target of attention, depending on whether intimidation, coercion, or
propaganda is primarily sought" (Schmid, 1988).


If the United Nations has defined terrorism as is above, how can you equate
the slave trade, the holocaust or economic sanctions on Iraq as being equal
to this phenomenon?  Your misinterpretation of the term is dangerous because
it indicates a clear aversion to the fact that what the Palestinian fringe
groups with the complicity of the PLO led Arafat practice is the form of
terrorism defined by a very authoritative body on this phenomenon while
Israeli incursions in response to these ghastly acts are not a clear match.
It also clearly highlights your misunderstanding of the issue at hand because
without a clear understanding of the term you simply cannot make an objective
judgement of the situation.

This is one of my contentions with your reasoning here but of course, you are
free to make choose your interpretation of this ghastly problem.  However,
one thing should be clear to all objective analyzers of this problem; i.e.,
there are clearly bad elements in this struggle who practice terrorism in
it's classic sense and hence selfishly not only sacrifice the children of the
innocent, but also put their own people in grave danger by 'inviting' the IDF
to make incursions which end up humiliating and maiming innocent
Palestinians.

  These incursions, regardless of consequence, are responses to attacks on
innocent Israelis, and the only way these acts could have been categorized as
above is if the objective of these incursions were expresssedly to target
Palestinian citizens. But IDF's actions to this point clearly disprove this
your theory.  The IDF instead has targeted Palestinian Authority headquarters
and the fringe groups involved in the planning and logistics of these ghastly
deeds.

Don't get me wrong, I disapprove of the side effects of the Jenin operation
but to me it was a justified and reasonable incursion.   Jenin has been a
hotbed of Islamic militia for a long time.  This makes it a logical place to
attack & probe by virtue of it being the base of the suicide bomber and the
planner.  It is thus logical for the IDF to move on certain elements in this
place.

The article, Once Upon A Time In Jenin, clearly shows fighting in this place
was intense.  Booby trapped buildings and suicide bombers in Red Cross vans
are indications of the type of fight this notoriously militant area put up
against the IDF. Million dollar question is why would anyone even bother
leaving their houses in the face of such a conflict?  If anything this
article shows the mission of the IDF was not to expressedly target civilians
in Jenin. Most of the civilians perished due to the unfortunate side human
casualties of war.  This is not to say that there were no atrocities and I
hope the UN investigators shed more light on this disputed issue, but fact is
the mission was obviously not conducted to target innocent Palestinians and
hence the departure from terrorism in this context.

Before signing off, I would also like to take a look at Habib's piece
yesterday which interestingly enough took time to explain what the Zionists
are purportedly about.  His piece expressedly took a swipe at the Zionists as
if to they were behind this operation.  But I refuse to subscribe to this
view because Israel has a democratically elected government and parliament
which consists of the whole range of political views from ultra moderates to
hard core fundamentalists (Zionists).  Therefore, to lay blame at the
doorstep of Zionism and Zionists is a bit misguided.  Furthermore, to view
the Israeli State as one which is not respectful of the UN or the
international community is off tangent, for after all, they are part of the
UN and like most civilized countries they do abide by most rules of this
body.  Furthermore, his points about the Jews thinking they are superior to
everyone borders on extreme prejudice.  After all, doesn't Islam and all
other religions preach the same?

I still support the idea of a Palestinian State for this is long overdue but
under the present conditions such a proposition is not feasible.  The
Palestinians should try to do something about the wicked people within their
midst who preach hate and not love to their children.  IMO, the Israelis have
done a better job of raising their young ones.

_Yus

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