Of course, we as a nation are so overwhelmingly vilified by US media that such tragedies happening to us don't get awarded the label of "Terrorism."
[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Majid_Shahriari [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fereydoon_Abbasi [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masoud_Alimohammadi [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Darioush_Rezaeinejad [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mostafa_Ahmadi-Roshan
From what I can tell, most terrorists want to achieve a more specific goal than just to maximize civilian damage. Here are some groups which are called terrorist organizations:
Earth Liberation Front: carries out property damage related to fur farming, meat packing, GMO research, logging, etc.
Army of God, a Christian anti-abortionist group: kidnapped a doctor who performed abortions, and his wife, murdered or attempted to murder abortion providers, and carried out clinic bombings and arson.
In both cases the goal was to increase the perceived costs of respectively exploiting the environment and carrying out abortions.
What is the difference between a targeted murder of a foreign scientists by the CIA and a targeted murder of an abortion provider?
(I use "murder" because I think "assassination" is a fancy name partially meant to justify murder as an aspect of state power.)
> To show his sincerity and goodwill, the agent put his hand over his heart. “Salam habibi,” he said.
Either the reporter, or the CIA hasn't done their research. Habibi is Arabic, and that's not how Iranian greet each other, especially if they want to show sincerity and goodwill.
I mean, there are plenty of possibilities here, including that the person describing the event is describing it second hand well after a decade has passed.
Don't be in such a rush to judgement; you might learn something.
I'm sure his salutation was forgiven...the offer is what makes him think a trillion things a second.
Although I doubt the "mistake" was unintentional.
But maybe now it make sense why they want to thwart their research efforts and destroy their 'reactors' ? ;P
See also, Searl. http://www.searlsolution.com/technology2.html
If you use the definition "untargeted civillian attacks", then that excludes the 9/11 attacks. As I understand it, the targets were: the World Trade center, as a symbol of US economic power, the Pentagon as the center of US military power, and flight 93 was headed towards DC, so perhaps the Capital building or the White House, as an attack on political power.
The goals of those who planned and carried out 9/11 was not simply to strike fear. "Al-Qaeda and bin Laden cited U.S. support of Israel, the presence of U.S. troops in Saudi Arabia, and sanctions against Iraq as motives."
Either it's somebody's sock puppet account or someone new who doesn't understand that HN really is different from Reddit and a higher level of intellectual discourse works much better here.
Given the context of an intelligence officer knocking on an unfamiliar person's hotel room door unexpected and asking them to defect, I think "salaam habibi" would strike most Farsi speakers as a bizarre and malapropos greeting.
"Hola amigo. I’m from the CIA, and I want you to board a plane with me to the United States."
I see it as an indicator of careless journalism that the author is citing an unnamed source "familiar on the matter" about a 10-year-old conversation that he seems not to have transcribed into the right language. I put it into the same category of people who ask what part of Mexico the Puerto Ricans are from.
Maybe a better example would be... well, if they put their hand over their heart and said "salaam habibi" to an American scientist.
I suppose that depends on your definition of "US Americans".