While the UN Committee to Eliminate Terrorism remains deadlocked over defining the very meaning of "terrorism," and as it tries to draw a distinction between "freedom fighters" and "state-sponsored terrorism," it would be wise to recall what Noam Chomsky wrote immediately after the attacks on Sept 11, 2001: "When we estimate the human toll of a crime, we count not only those who were literally or instantly murdered on the spot, but those who died as a result, as a consequence of the crime." Still, why only stop with counting those who were initially killed by an individual or group that commits acts of terrorism, and then those killed afterwards by a state or an empire that also sponsors sustained terrorism through violence and war? In other words, why not also include the innocent victims that were brutally attacked, bombed, assassinated, kidnapped, and murdered, years before an event is ever labeled or defined as a terrorist act?
