Define terrorism

Israeli settlers shooting at unarmed Palestinian villagers are not terrorists. Hizbullah guerrillas shooting at Israeli occupation soldiers are. Why? Because the US State Department says so. Thomas Gorguissian writes from Washington
The State Department's annual terrorism report, released last week, showed that global terrorist attacks rose by 8 per cent, to 423 international incidents in 2000. Latin America accounted for the largest growth in terrorist attacks, while South Asia remained the focal point for terrorism directed against the United States. As always, the Middle East had its fair share of "terrorist groups and their state sponsors."
The report, entitled "Patterns of Global Terrorism 2000," listed 19 US citizens killed in acts of terrorism last year, 17 of them in the bombing attack on the Navy destroyer USS Cole on 12 October in the Yemeni port of Aden. That attack was considered "the most significant act of anti-US terrorism in 2000."
Osama bin Laden, Al-Qaida and affiliates featured prominently. The US still considers Iran as "the most active state sponsor" of terrorism and the Taliban's Afghanistan as a safe haven for international terrorists.
In its overview of the Middle East, the report said: "The last few months of the year brought a significant increase in the overall level of political violence and terrorism in the region, especially in Israel and the occupied territories. Much of the late-year increase in violence was driven by a breakdown in negotiations and counter-terrorism cooperation between Israel and the Palestinian Authority [PA]."
The report also pointed out that "several disrupted plans to attack US and Israeli targets in the Middle East purportedly were intended to demonstrate anger over Israel's sometimes disproportionate use of force to contain protests and perceptions that the United States 'allowed' Israel to act."
The number of anti-US attacks rose from 169 in 1999 to 200 attacks. The increase was attributed to bombing attacks against an oil pipeline in Colombia, "which is viewed by terrorists as a US target," the report said.
Sudan and North Korea were given credit for beginning to cooperate with the United States in fighting terrorist groups. But according to US officials, they have not yet done enough to be removed from the "state-sponsored terrorism" list. The latter, unchanged since Sudan was added in 1993, also includes Cuba, Iran, Iraq, Libya, Syria and North Korea.
Secretary of State Colin Powell introduced the report on an optimistic note, saying, "State sponsors of terrorism are increasingly isolated, terrorist groups are under growing pressure and terrorists are being brought to justice." The investigation of the Cole bombing, the UN resolution tightening sanctions on the Taliban -- for allegedly harbouring bin Laden and his terrorist training camps -- and the arrest of individuals suspected of involvement in the 1998 bombing of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania were mentioned as examples of international cooperation in combating terrorism.
More specifically, Powell mentioned a rise in American collaboration with a number of countries. "We maintain strong working relationships with many of our allies in the Middle East, including Jordan, Egypt and Israel, and we look to expanding partnerships in the Arabian Peninsula," Powell said. "We are reaching out to the Central Asian states. We continue to work closely with India. And we work through multilateral organisations such as the UN, the G-8 and a number of others."
For many observers, this annual report and US anti-terrorism policy in general suffer from a problem of definition. The American government defines terrorism in a highly politicised way and is selective in terms of its application.
In its section on Israel and the West Bank and Gaza, the report states: "Israeli officials publicly expressed their dissatisfaction with PA counter-terrorism efforts during the crisis. The Israelis also accused PA security officials and Fatah members of facilitating and taking part in shooting and bombing attacks against Israeli targets."
The inclusion of Israeli allegations in this official US document "is totally inappropriate and unnecessary since it raises serious doubts about the credibility and independence of the report throughout the region," Anti-Discrimination Committee (ADC) President Hala Maksoud wrote in a letter to Secretary Powell. She added, "The situation is further exacerbated by the fact that the report did not include Palestinian complaints about 'excessive and disproportionate' Israeli attacks on innocent Palestinian civilians, even though such complaints were reiterated by the United Nations Security Council, the UN Human Rights Commission, Amnesty International and even State Department officials."
When a reporter raised the issue of terrorism acts committed by Israeli death squads and other units of the Israeli army, Edmund Hull, the US State Department's acting coordinator for counter-terrorism, responded: "With regard to Israeli actions, I think you have to understand that 'Patterns of Global Terrorism,' as we explained in the introduction, deals with phenomena that meet a specific definition; that is, terrorism. Other phenomena of concern and certainly worthy of attention are addressed either in bilateral statements that we make, or many of them, such as the issue you raised about extra-judicial killings, are addressed in the Human Rights Report, and they are addressed at some length in those documents."
The issue of terrorism returned to the front burner in the US this week. The latest issue of New Yorker magazine reported that Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) Director Louis Freeh has given the Bush administration a list of people -- including Iranian officials -- whom the United States should indict in the 1996 bombing in Al-Khobar, Saudi Arabia that killed 19 American servicemen. Freeh, who will retire in June, told the magazine that this is "the only unfinished piece of business that I have." Soon the US embassies bombing trial will end and the Cole investigation may come to a conclusion. The Bush administration faces many "patterns of global terrorism" and many intelligence assessments indicate that "anti-Americanism" is on the rise. And not just in the Middle East.
Recommend this page
© Copyright Al-Ahram Weekly. All rights reserved
Send a letter to the Editor