On April 25 James Williamson asked the questions, “And what does it really mean to call the Palestinians terrorists? What is a terrorist?”

To answer his query, a terrorist is someone who, in the midst of an armed struggle, specifically targets non-combatants as a means to achieving the end toward which they are struggling. Oddly enough, there are laws that govern the waging of an armed struggle.

As a recent article from the Economist reminds us (April 18), “These laws try to sharpen two distinctions which are never entirely clear: between peace and armed conflict, and between soldiers and non-combatants. Once a conflict starts, the parties are entitled to kill combatants (even those not engaged in fighting), but they must spare and succour non-combatants and wounded fighters. When non-combatants die, that is not proof that their killers broke the law, but the onus is on the attackers to show that they tried to spare civilians.

“The fighting between Israelis and Palestinians does meet the definition of armed conflict, one in which both sides have organized structures and control certain places. So it was not illegal for Israel to seek out and kill members of the Palestinian militias, or for the Palestinians to hit back. Palestinian attacks on army checkpoints are an act of war, not a war crime, whereas blowing up buses and restaurants grossly flouts the law.”

It is this distinction which separates the suicide bomber out from the category of patriot, and places him or her squarely in the category of terrorist. In all of the examples of freedom fighters cited by Williamson, the targets were military or political, not random individuals. To make this distinction clear, the al-Qaida attack on the Pentagon was an act of war; the attack on the World Trade Center towers was a war crime.)

Williamson makes the claim that “We have watched the beginning of what may well be a new Holocaust, a systematic extermination of the Palestinian people by their democratic neighbor, Israel.”

I must disagree. If this were indeed Israel’s intention, she would not limit herself to the assassination of armed combatants, or to laying siege to the Palestinian Authority. Rather, she would systematically round up every man, woman and child of Palestinian descent, load them into transports, and send them to extermination camps to be turned into ashes and smoke. That would be a Palestinian Holocaust.

So what does it mean to call the Palestinians terrorists? Clearly not all Palestinians are terrorists; only those Palestinians who target non-combatants deserve that appellation. Williamson makes the claim that by making resort to suicide bombings, the Palestinians are “fighting back with the only weapons they have.” This same claim could also be made for al-Qaida, or for any armed group that lacks access to military jets and hardware. If the suicide bomber is legitimized as a fair means of war in the Middle East, then it becomes legitimized the world over.

If the targeting of non-combatants becomes a legitimate tactic in the Middle East, then no one, anywhere, will be safe. It would be a pleasure to meet to discuss this matter with Williamson over a cup of tea in a restaurant, if it weren’t for the possibility that the next generation of patriot or freedom fighter, inspired by the Palestinian tactic of suicide bombing, might have an eye on making an explosive argument at the next table.

David Alexander Cantor is rabbi of Congregation Beth Israel in Bangor.