Ends do not justify means

Letters

Editor: What is the difference between a terrorist and a freedom fighter? This perennial question has taken on even greater immediacy in our post-Sept. 11 world. Some have claimed that a distinction should be drawn between the attacks on the World Trade Centre and the "legitimate struggle" of the Palestinian people. Indeed, how are we to understand Palestinian aggression against the state and people of Israel?

Palestinian Authority Chairman Yasser Arafat provided an answer to this question more than 25 years ago in an address to the UN General Assembly. Arafat stated, "The difference between the revolutionary and the terrorist lies in the reason for which each fights. For whoever stands by a just cause and fights for freedom and liberation of his land ... cannot possibly be called a terrorist." For Arafat, nothing that is part of the Palestinian national struggle is terrorism.

In light of these words, we should not be surprised at the bloody, corpse-strewn scenes in Jerusalem and Haifa two weekends ago. According to Arafat's words, we should imagine the suicide bombers who targeted teenagers out on the town on a Saturday night as revolutionaries. After all, they were fighting for the "freedom and liberation of their land" and that is "the difference between the revolutionary and the terrorist."

Supposedly, Arafat had changed his tune since 1974 and had de-legitimized violence as a means to achieve Palestinian national aspirations. Yet, more than one year ago, Arafat released Islamic fundamentalist terrorists from Palestinian prisons. He has done little or nothing to crack down on terrorism against Israel. Members of his own Fatah and Force 17 participate regularly in terrorist activities against the people of Israel. While, in his words, Arafat may have changed his tune, his actions are playing the same old song. It is time that the West sent Arafat a very simple message in ethics and morality: the ends do not justify the means. If you target innocent citizens, including women and children, you are a terrorist, no matter how noble your cause. Acts of terrorism against Israeli citizens are the moral equivalent of the Sept. 11 World Trade Centre attacks.

Rabbi Ross Singer
Vancouver

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