DEBATE OVER DEFINITION OF TERRORISM

"... confusion and doubt arose (after Joseph Stack's airplane attack on an IRS building) over whether a person who perpetrated a classic act of Terrorism should, in fact, be called a Terrorist: he's not a Muslim and isn't acting on behalf of standard Muslim grievances against the U.S. or Israel, and thus does not fit the "definition." It has really come to mean: "a Muslim who fights against or even expresses hostility towards the United States, Israel and their allies."
If an American Muslim argues that violence against the U.S. (particularly when aimed at military targets) is justified due to American violence aimed at the Muslim world, that person is a Terrorist who deserves assassination... if the U.S. military invades a Muslim country, Muslims who live in the invaded and occupied country and who fight back against the invading American army -- by attacking nothing but military targets -- are also Terrorists.... (And) large numbers of detainees at Guantanamo were accused of being Terrorists for nothing more than attacking members of an invading foreign army in their country..."
http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/02/19/terrorism/index.html

"... Stratfor, an Austin-based global intelligence firm specializing in international risk management, said the rhetoric in Stack's rant clearly matches the USA Patriot Act's definition of terrorism: a criminal act that is intended to "intimidate or coerce a civilian population to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or to affect the conduct of a government by assassination or kidnapping..."
http://www.daytondailynews.com/news/nation-world-news/plane-attack-prompts-debate-over-terrorism-label-558975.html