Israel Kills 10 in Palestinian Aid Convoy

You're incorrect about the civilians losing their civilian status and that Israel would have had the legal ability to simply attack and sink the ship.

Please provide a citation to support your claim.

I accept your concession in advance on this point.

You're claim regarding the targeting of civilians as being the defining feature of terrorism is also false.

At no point, has any American administration (or any other country) operated under such a definition.

A
R
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oralloy wrote:

The US has not targeted civilians within the past hundred years, if ever.

Carpet bombing in Vietnam

Napalming villages in Vietnam

Free fire zones in Vietnam

My Lai Massacre

The Tiger Force massacres

Carpet bombing in Laos and Cambodia

Fire bombing in Tokyo

Nuclear bombs against Japanese

Nicaragua

El Salvador

The Philippines

Want more, boy?

You could at the least tell Oral that he's full of **** because you know that he's full of ****.

Carpet bombing in Vietnam
Carpet bombing in Laos and Cambodia

Nuclear bombs against Japanese

My Lai Massacre

Fire bombing in Tokyo

Nicaragua
El Salvador
The Philippines

US official documents that have been recently been declassified show that......

You're pretty good at writing checks you can't cash.

Quote:

You're claim regarding the targeting of civilians as being the defining feature of terrorism is also false.

No it isn't.

If only there were more like her.....

12 October 2000- USS COLE terrorist attack
While refueling in Aden Harbor, Yemen USS COLE was victim of terrorist attack. USS COLE was attacked on Port Mid-Ships by a small boat with explosives onboard. The result of which led to a 40 by 60 foot hole and the loss of 17 sailors.

The United States Department of Defense defines terrorism as:
premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against non-combatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience.
—Title 22 of the United States Code section 2656f(d).[53]

A footnote at the bottom of this definition qualifies and explains the Department of Defense's understanding of this legal definition:
For the purposes of this definition, the term "noncombatant" is interpreted to include,in addition to civilians, military personnel who at the time of the incident are unarmed and/or not on duty ... We also consider as acts of terrorism attacks on military installations or on armed personnel when a state of military hostilities does not exist at the site, such as bombings against US bases in Europe, the Philippines or elsewhere

In 1985, when I was the Deputy Director of the Reagan White House Task Force on Terrorism, [my working group was asked] to come up with a definition of terrorism that could be used throughout the government. We produced about six, and each and every case, they were rejected, because careful reading would indicate that our own country had been involved in some of those activities. […] After the task force concluded its work, Congress [passed] U.S. Code Title 18, Section 2331 ... the US definition of terrorism. […] one of the terms, "international terrorism," means "activities that," I quote, "appear to be intended to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination or kidnapping." […] Yes, well, certainly, you can think of a number of countries that have been involved in such activities. Ours is one of them. […] And so, the terrorist, of course, is in the eye of the beholder.

Edward Peck, former U.S. Chief of Mission in Iraq (under Jimmy Carter) and former ambassador to Mauritania

And just for JTT...

And so, the terrorist, of course, is in the eye of the beholder.

how many would you use?

It seems that this attack is considered very specifically a terrorist attack despite your claim.

Quote:

12 October 2000- USS COLE terrorist attack
While refueling in Aden Harbor, Yemen USS COLE was victim of terrorist attack. USS COLE was attacked on Port Mid-Ships by a small boat with explosives onboard. The result of which led to a 40 by 60 foot hole and the loss of 17 sailors.

Source: http://www.cole.navy.mil/site%20pages/history.aspx

This would be the official .mil site for the USS Cole. It seems that this attack is considered very specifically a terrorist attack despite your claim.

More here...

Write up on USS Cole attack.

United States Department of Defense wrote:

The United States Department of Defense defines terrorism as:
premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against non-combatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents, usually intended to influence an audience.
—Title 22 of the United States Code section 2656f(d).[53]

A footnote at the bottom of this definition qualifies and explains the Department of Defense's understanding of this legal definition:
For the purposes of this definition, the term "noncombatant" is interpreted to include, in addition to civilians, military personnel who at the time of the incident are unarmed and/or not on duty ... We also consider as acts of terrorism attacks on military installations or on armed personnel when a state of military hostilities does not exist at the site, such as bombings against US bases in Europe, the Philippines or elsewhere

Oralloy - You still didn't cite how the flotilla passengers somehow magically weren't civilians anymore.

If you can't, you've talked yourself in a circle regarding attacking non-combatants.

oralloy wrote:

failures art wrote:

Please provide a citation to support your claim.

http://www.icrc.org/ihl.nsf/FULL/560

"98. Merchant vessels believed on reasonable grounds to be breaching a blockade may be captured. Merchant vessels which, after prior warning, clearly resist capture may be attacked."

It would mean that Israel had committed terrorism by your definition otherwise.

Gee, you skipped Cuba.

The Cuba nonsense looked especially preposterous. I'd chalk it all up to the "pure fiction" category.

Moral matters and 'who shot first' aside, I would like to point out that Freedom of Seas dictates that any civilian ship may pass through international waters unobstructed.

The law is on the side of the protesters.

I focus on the targeting of civilians because that is the element that makes terrorism so objectionable.

A report this month in the Toledo Blade uncovers massacres committed by U.S. troops in Vietnam that has gone unreported for 36 years.

In a story that has never been told, an elite platoon torched villages, executed prisoners, and slaughtered an untold number of unarmed civilians between May and November, 1967.

The platoon was called Tiger Force. A small, highly trained unit of 45 paratroopers, Tiger Force was created to spy on enemy forces in one of the most highly contested areas of South Vietnam: the Central Highlands.

For seven months in 1967, they violently lost control and carried out the longest series of atrocities in the Vietnam War.

As their commanders looked the other way, Tiger Force troops dropped grenades into underground bunkers where women and children were hiding. They shot unarmed civilians, in some cases as they begged for their lives. They frequently tortured and shot prisoners, severing ears and scalps for souvenirs.

After learning about the atrocities a few years later, the Army investigated the platoon for 4 1/2 years, finding numerous eyewitnesses and substantiating war crimes. The case reached the highest levels of the Pentagon and the Nixon White House. But in the end, no one was prosecuted and the case buried in the archives for three decades.

AMY GOODMAN: Michael Sallah, I wanted to play a clip from one of the soldiers, former Tiger-Force team leader sergeant William Doyle and in this, he’s speaking with your colleague. You wrote this expose with, Mitch Weiss.

WILLIAM DOYLE: We just didn’t care, you know, what everybody did out there. Everybody was supposed to cover each other’s ass. If they didn’t, they were in mortal danger.

MITCH WEISS: Mm-hmm.

WILLIAM DOYLE: And that’s just the way it was.

MITCH WEISS: How were you living day-to-day?

WILLIAM DOYLE: We didn’t expect to live. Nobody out there with any brains expected to live.

MITCH WEISS: Mm-hmm.

WILLIAM DOYLE: You know, you did any God damn thing you felt like doing.

MITCH WEISS: Mm-hmm.

WILLIAM DOYLE: You’re surprised you’re still alive next week, so, you know, you do any God-damned thing you felt like doiní.

MITCH WEISS: Mm-hmm.

WILLIAM DOYLE: And especially to stay alive. I’m not saying you give up and die. You still gotta live but the way to live is to kill, because you don’t have to worry about anybody thatís dead, but you have to worry about the living The first idea that crosses your mind, you pull the trigger. If it just crosses your mind, you pull the trigger.

MITCH WEISS: So, in other words, if you went into a __ you weren’t sure—

WILLIAM DOYLE: If I walked into a village and everybody wasn’t postured on the ground, I shot those standing up.

AMY GOODMAN: ìI shot those standing up,î saying ìyou didn’t have to worry about those who were dead. You only had to be concerned about the living.î

MICHAEL SALLAH: Yeah. William Doyle offers no remorse or apologies for what he did. He said he would do it all over again. I think if his—One of his other lines was that if—He clearly felt that the war ended too soon. He says, ìIf I had known the war was gonna end that soon, I would have killed more.î That was his version of events. He—

AMY GOODMAN: Well, let me play one more comment of former Tiger-Force team-leader sergeant William Doyle, again speaking with the "Toledo blade’s" Mitch Weiss, describing killing farmers as they planted rice.

WILLIAM DOYLE: Well, some of ëem kept on plantiní rice. You don’t put your head up to look at somebody when you’re planting rice.

MITCH WEISS: Mm-hmm.

WILLIAM DOYLE: You know, you don’t kill with a look.

MITCH WEISS: Mm-hmm.

WILLIAM DOYLE: _

MITCH WEISS: So they were killed because they looked at you guys? Is that what happened?

WILLIAM DOYLE: Yeah, more or less. It comes to your attention, you pull the trigger.

MITCH WEISS: Mm-hmm.

WILLIAM DOYLE: You know? If it crosses your mind to pull the trigger, you want to live, you pull it.

MITCH WEISS: Mm-hmm.

WILLIAM DOYLE: Any mistake you make you make in your own favor.

AMY GOODMAN: ny mistake you make, you make in your own favor." We actually reached sergeant William Doyle on the phone. He wouldn’t come on with us today. But he did say blame it all on me. Blame it all on me. Don’t blame it on anyone else. It’s all my fault. Your response to that, Michael Sallah?

MICHAEL SALLAH: No, it’s not all his fault. It was partly his fault, but there was a culture in the unit that it was a kill-unit and the leadership of the unit, all the way up to the commanders, knew what they were doing. They looked the other way. They allowed it to happen. Now, William Doyle was one of many who were involved in these atrocities and he’s not alone.

http://www.democracynow.org/2003/10/29/tiger_force_a_new_report_uncovers