War of Words, part II -- "Terrorism"

2. “Terrorism.”

This one has bothered me for a long time. What does “terrorism” mean?

Webster Dictionary defines it as “the systematic use of terror especially as a means of coercion.” Terror is defined as “a state of intense fear.” Dictionary.com translates terrorism as “the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, especially for political purposes.”

This term is inadequate here for numerous reasons.

Firstly, “use of terror” is too vague. Is my eight-year-old then a terrorist because her antics inspire fear amongst her sibling? I personally know numerous individuals who feel terrorized by their children, in-laws, ruthless bosses or supervisors at work, etc.

The Israelis can easily be accused of “terrorizing” suspicious Arabs at security checkpoints. Building homes for Jewish families in Jerusalem (or anywhere else in the West Bank)? Well, hardliner Arab nationalists feel terrified by that. So that’s terror too.

Speaking of security, my friend was terrified to fly because of the harassment he was subjected to at the airport. Can the TSA be rightfully called a terrorist organization?

Terror is in the eyes of the beholder. Indeed, CNN refused to acknowledge the obvious that the Itamar massacre was in fact terrorism. Instead, their article was entitled “Israeli family of 5 killed in ‘terror attack’, military says.” They made sure to encircle the words “terror attack” with quotations, suggesting that there is a doubt whether the brutal murder was indeed an act of terrorism. The body of the report said that “Five members of an Israeli family were killed in the West Bank early Saturday morning in what the Israeli military is calling a ‘terror attack.’” The Israeli military called it a terror attack, but the “unbiased” media leaves room for doubt.

“Terrorism,” therefore, is an ambiguous term that can be easily construed or misconstrued to fit anyone’s agenda. It allows for convenient moral equivalence to be drawn between the murderer and the victim. The disturbed employee who went on a killing spree at the post office felt terrorized by the federal government, so he “terrorized” them back.

Moreover, terrorism doesn’t do justice to the actual crimes committed. Whom would you rather be? The slain victim or the survivor? The term terrorism would suggest that the primary target of the terrorist act is the survivor who now is in an induced state of terror, whereas the actual victim is dead (and in some cases, died instantly or with momentary terror). The survivor should then be accurately described as the “victim” of terrorism. The slain victim is nothing more than a technicality. Calling it “terrorism” is effectively sanitizing the egregious act of mass murder.

However, all the above arguments aside, even if we will accept the definition of terrorism quoted above (“the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce, especially for political purposes”), this might pertain to the IRA or Russian nihilist anarchists of the 19th century. Contemporary extremist Islamists, however, are quite a different story.

You see, the modern-day jihadist doesn’t necessarily have a political or coercive objective in mind. He just wants to murder us. It’s his religion, as pathologically depraved as it sounds. Murder for the sake of murder.

Moreover, even if we were to be so naïve as to accept the LA Times’ outrageous assertion that this atrocity was in protest to the settlements, murder of Jews by Muslim jihadists cannot rightfully be described as terrorism for a specific political objective. Imagine that the terrorists were to accomplish this stated goal, the dismantling of all settlements. Does anyone seriously believe that there would be peace? Certainly not. The terrorists would continue to murder us until Israel would cease to exist. And then what? Then the Muslim Brotherhood could be free to take over where Hitler left off, Heaven forefend (לא תקום פעמים צרה).

In other words, the baby-slaying of last week was not a means toward a political end. It was the end in itself. The jihadist’s ultimate objective is genocide. His ruthless acts of murder are methodical and deliberate, consistent with his end goal.

In light of all the above, I feel that Muslim jihadists ought not to be called terrorists. Instead, why not just call them what they are? They are Islamofascist mass murderers.

Okay, so the problem with “mass murderer” is that it implies that the perpetrator personally murdered many victims. For example, Hitler, Eichmann or Arafat might be called mass murderers, but the low level Gestapo guard who murdered few might not.

So let’s create a new, more fitting description. They are Islamofascist genocidal murderers.

It doesn’t matter if they murdered one or five or more, G-d forbid. They carried out their dark deed as part of a determined and sustained effort to commit genocide. They participated in genocide, so they are genocidal murderers.

The modern jihadist movement is not a new phenomenon. It is part of the genocide movement begun by Hitler and Al Husseini, erstwhile Mufti of Jerusalem. The thousands of murders perpetrated by Arab “terrorists” since Oslo are not isolated acts of terror for particular political objectives. They are part of a consistent plan of the Muslim Brotherhood to commit genocide, a Final Solution, if you would.

May the Almighty protect us from their evil schemes. May G-d grant our leaders the wisdom to acknowledge the enemy for what it is and take the painful but necessary measures to deal with the threat effectively and responsibly.

Tomorrow we'll address another oft-misunderstood catchphrase, "Palestinians."