What is terrorism?

"Arab Music" for your cellphone:



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Less than 12 hours after the 9/11 commemorative speech to the nation of president George W. Bush, we assisted to a terrorist attack to the American Embassy in Syria.

Just yesterday, president George W. Bush had clearly said that there are terrorist organizations supported by terrorist countries. In a global confusion he mentioned Syria, Iran, North Korea and Lebanon as terrorist countries. He also talked about "Islamic fascists" in a previous speech (as italian I know what Fascism means and it's not that ... it's worse).

Strange, very strange. Just a couple of days ago Iran's former president, Mohammad Khatami, says Washington is flat out wrong about Iran and terrorism and just today Syria lost soldiers in front of the American Embassy to defend American diplomats and employees against the terrorism. Today, the U.S. government thanked Syria (a country this administration don't want even to talk to) for their help in this unpleasent situation.

Talking about Lebanon and Palestine the word terrorism came out multiple times in the last months at the point that Tony Blair was definitely not welcome in Beiruth yesterday, because the word war and terrorism cannot be put so easily in the same milkshake.

I immagine that no matter if you agree or not with a certain ideology, if someone attacks your country the natural reaction is to fight against who attacks you especially when you don't have a war in place as it was during World War II and World War I in which the population inside the countries organized the resistence waiting for the arrival of the allies. At this point I would be very annoyed if someone start destroying my houses, my infrastructures, my schools killing civilians, families an friends without a specific reason nodody had time to explain to me in advance.

The reality of the fact is that there is a simple action called "diplomacy" which allows to talk to your enemies as well and you really have to be 1000% sure they are terroists and not just against your policies and lifestyle. The reality of the fact is that Iran, a country with a President I definitely don't like at all, is still in the situation to have his rights to choose to develop nuclear power because none of the countries who requested actions against Iran is going to dismantel their own nuclear power facilities.

So the threshold between, richness and terrorism, poverty and terrorism, exasperation and terrorism, religion and terrorism, starvation and terrorism, monopoly and terrorism, corporation and terrorism, is very easy to be reached, because both in the east and in the west terrorism can be physical, psyological, religious and/or driven by the power and the desire to expand elsewhere.

I think it's about time the American government starts understanding these differences because just yesterday, CNN were investigating why the American message is so confusing and perceived so badly not only by the Arab countries, but also by Europe and Asia at the point that most of the world don't trust the American foreign politics and behaviour and more than the 50% of the American starting doubting about the answers given regarding the 9/11 attack.

I'm not rising questions. I'm only reporting questions posed by others and many of them are Americans.

Lou Dobbs, certainly not a progressist, wrote an interesting article regarding the lack of understanding of the American administrations of the middle east (see article below).

Maybe the attack at the American Embassy in Syria could be a good signal to revisit certain attitudes of this administration towards the entire world.

Follow hereafter a few CNN articles of your interest.


1 - Khatami: Fight against terror has sparked extremism

CHICAGO, Illinois (CNN) -- The United States has accused Iran of fueling the conflict in Iraq, and arming Hezbollah with rockets and guns in its war with Israel.
Tehran has also been blasted for its uranium enrichment program.
Iran's former president, Mohammad Khatami, says Washington is flat out wrong about Iran.
This week during a trip to the United States, he spoke with CNN Anchor Zain Verjee through a translator.
VERJEE: Thank you so much for this interview. What is your message to the American people?
KHATAMI: I also thank you for the interview that you have organized here today. I have repeated several times before and I'd like to repeat it again that people of the United States are a good people, that the rich culture, that the Anglo-American culture is a very rich one.
America possesses a deep technical and financial know-how and I've always said that such people with such greatness should be safeguarding the pillars of peace in the international arena.
And this country can, by adopting the right position of its government, get more help in order to advance the causes of democracy and advanced technological know-how and play a vital role in other countries acquiring such knowledges....
They [Americans] wanted religious freedom at the time the Constitution was given birth. They wanted religious freedom to be a big part of it. And freedom and religious tolerance were supposed to be able to co-exist together. And such people with such greatness should not be misused or used towards advancing violent policies that seem to be taking place throughout the world.
I would like to pay my respects to the people of the United States with the hope that we can move towards a path that will give us permanent peace on the world stage, not on a limited basis.
VERJEE: You say that you may be concerned that the American people are being used -- what do you mean by that? Or, misused.
KHATAMI: I believe that some of the policies that are undertaken here in the United States, even though they originate with a great deal of good will, they unfortunately may have negative side effects. Some of the initiatives to bring security on the world stage, through violence in order to obtain one's goal, do not help to eliminate violence across the world.
For example, the policies that have been undertaken during the last few years, particularly in the Middle East, have only contributed to the advancement of extremism in the region and throughout the world. As a result of which, the American people, and other people throughout the world, have suffered great consequences.
Billions of dollars of American taxpayer money have been spent to pursue wrong policies throughout the Middle East. A lot of the youth of the United States suffer a lot of -- maybe in positions to be harmed as a result of such policies that are executed through violence. The response will only be violence.
Regional terror
I have no doubt that today the backers of extremists in the Middle East, as result of such policies, have been given more life and more muscle to move towards their extremism, particularly in the name of such policies that are extended in the region through violence. And unfortunately, it is used as an excuse also, to some extent throughout the world, through the hands of extremists.
VERJEE: The U.S. government -- the American people -- may say in the region .... [go to http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/09/05/verjee.khatami/index.html]


2 - U.S. lauds Syrian forces in embassy attack

DAMASCUS, Syria (CNN) -- U.S. officials praised Syrian security forces for thwarting Tuesday's attack on the U.S. Embassy in Damascus despite the usually tense relationship with the Middle Eastern country.
The Syrians killed three attackers and apprehended a suspect outside the embassy after a car exploded near the walls of the American compound, the Syrian Information Ministry said.
"I do think the Syrians reacted to the attack in a way that helped to secure our people, and we very much appreciate that," U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said while visiting Canada.
Four attackers detonated the car bomb before attempting to storm the compound, the Syrian ministry said.
The Syrian forces met the attackers, and an embassy guard was killed battling them, the ministry said.
Fourteen people were wounded, including the suspect, an embassy policeman, a security worker and 11 civilians, among them two Iraqis and a Chinese official, according to Syria's state-run news agency, SANA.
China's state-run Xinhua News agency said a senior diplomat was slightly injured by shrapnel while standing on a rooftop in the nearby Chinese Embassy compound.
The Syrian Information Ministry said none of the embassy staff was wounded and the building was not damaged. As a precaution, the embassy and its affiliated school were closed until Thursday.
Usually about 30 Syrian guards are posted around the embassy 24 hours a day, said Imad Moustapha, Syria's ambassador to the United States.
Video from the scene showed the burned-out wreckage of a car and blood-soaked streets near the embassy, which is in a residential neighborhood of Damascus.
Syrian authorities found and dismantled another car bomb outside the embassy's walls. The vehicle was rigged with explosives, including some bombs made with propane gas tanks, according to Syria's state-run news agency and video from the scene.
Syrian authorities successfully defused other explosive devices found around the embassy, U.S. State Department spokesman Tom Casey said. [go to http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/09/12/syria.embassy/index.html]


3 - Protests as Blair visits Lebanon

BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) -- Angry protesters -- including an Irish peace activist who disrupted a news conference Monday -- marred a visit by British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who had sided with Washington against a quick cease-fire in the Israeli-Hezbollah conflict.
The lame duck leader committed the rest of his time in office to building a lasting peace in Lebanon and between Israel and the Palestinians.
Blair, the first British leader to visit Lebanon, flew to Beirut in a show of support for the nation's government nearly a month after a 34-day war between Israel and Hezbollah devastated large parts of south Lebanon and vital infrastructure nationwide.
Britain's leader said he was not surprised by the strong feelings of those who accused him of backing Israel's monthlong offensive, which killed more than 850 people in Lebanon, most of them civilians.
"Of course feelings run high, innocent people lost their lives here, this country ... has been set back by years," said Blair, the second Western leader to come to Beirut since fighting erupted in July. French Prime Minister Dominique de Villepin was in the Lebanese capital July 17, the fifth day of the war.
Blair has defended his stance on the Lebanon war, saying it was important to take the time to craft a settlement that would hold rather than settle for a quick peace likely to collapse.
As Blair stood beside Lebanon's Prime Minister Fuad Saniora, Caoimhe Butterly, a well-known Irish peace activist, shouted that the British leader's visit was "an insult."
"Shame on you Tony Blair," Butterly yelled, holding a banner that read: "Boycott Israeli apartheid."
Her protest was captured by live television cameras, until security guards holding her by her arms and legs escorted her out of Saniora's office complex. The two leaders watched in silence, then Saniora said: "It's all right, we are in a democracy ... we respect all sorts of expression."
Blair then pledged Britain would help Lebanon rebuild. And both he and Saniora said a resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict was crucial to securing stability in the entire region.
"I hope out of ... what has been a tragic and terrible time, we can rebuild in a way that gives not just lasting peace here in the Lebanon but a lasting peace in the region," Blair said. "I believe it can be done. And furthermore I commit myself for the remainder of my time in office to do everything I can to bring that about."
Saniora said solving the Palestinian issue was the core to peace not only in the Middle East but throughout the Islamic world. He called on Blair "to play a positive role in reviving the peace process."
"Only by addressing the underlying causes can we guarantee peace and security for the Middle East," Saniora said.
Outside, about 5,000 protesters -- kept about half a mile (kilometer) from the government headquarters -- shouted angry chants. [go to http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/09/11/blair.lebanon.ap/index.html]


4 - Dobbs: Not so smart when it comes to the Middle East

NEW YORK (CNN) -- We Americans like to think we're a pretty smart people, even when evidence to the contrary is overwhelming. And nowhere is that evidence more overwhelming than in the Middle East. History in the Middle East is everything, and we Americans seem to learn nothing from it.
President Harry Truman took about 20 minutes to recognize the state of Israel when it declared independence in 1948. Since then, more than 58 years of war, terrorism and blood-letting have led to the events of the past week.
Even now, as Katyusha rockets rain down on northern Israel and Israeli fighter jets blast Hezbollah targets in southern Lebanon, we simultaneously decry radical Islamist terrorism and Israel's lack of restraint in defending itself.
And the U.S. government, which wants no part of a cease-fire until Israel is given every opportunity to rescue its kidnapped soldiers and destroy as many Hezbollah and Hezbollah armaments as possible, urges caution in the interest of preserving a nascent and fragile democratic government in Lebanon. Could we be more conflicted?
While the United States provides about $2.5 billion in military and economic aid to Israel each year, U.S. aid to Lebanon amounts to no more than $40 million. This despite the fact that the per capita GDP of Israel is among the highest in the world at $24,600, nearly four times as high as Lebanon's GDP per capita of $6,200.
Lebanon's lack of wealth is matched by the Palestinians -- three out of every four Palestinians live below the poverty line. Yet the vast majority of our giving in the region flows to Israel. This kind of geopolitical inconsistency and shortsightedness has contributed to the Arab-Israeli conflict that the Western world seems content to allow to perpetuate endlessly.
After a week of escalating violence, around two dozen Israelis and roughly 200 Lebanese have died. That has been sufficient bloodshed for United Nations Secretary General Kofi Annan and British Prime Minister Tony Blair to join in the call for an international security force, ignoring the fact that a U.N. force is already in Southern Lebanon, having failed to secure the border against Hezbollah's incursions and attacks and the murder and kidnapping of Israeli soldiers.
As our airwaves fill with images and sounds of exploding Hezbollah rockets and Israeli bombs, this seven-day conflict has completely displaced from our view another war in which 10 Americans and more than 300 Iraqis have died during the same week. And it is a conflict now of more than three years duration that has claimed almost 15,000 lives so far this year alone...... [go to http://www.cnn.com/2006/US/07/18/dobbs.july19/index.html].