Professor Thane Rosenbaum took to the pages of the Wall Street Journal on Monday to argue that Gazans dying and suffering from Israeli bombardment are not truly innocent civilians in the normal sense of the word. This is because, as Rosenbaum tells it, they support the Hamas government in Gaza, which is militantly opposed to the Israeli occupation. In his effort to wish away the civilian atrocities in Gaza, Rosenbaum has inadvertently made the argument of a terrorist.

About one year after 9/11, Osama bin Laden wrote a letter to America in which he explained, among other things, why it was legitimate to target American civilians in the al-Qaeda attack:

the American people are the ones who choose their government by way of their own free will; a choice which stems from their agreement to its policies. Thus the American people have chosen, consented to, and affirmed their support for the Israeli oppression of the Palestinians, the occupation and usurpation of their land, and its continuous killing, torture, punishment and expulsion of the Palestinians. The American people have the ability and choice to refuse the policies of their Government and even to change it if they want.

Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, the Rosenbaum-Laden argument for stripping away civilian immunity from military attacks also received support from University of Colorado professor Ward Churchill. In a controversial essay about the attacks, professor Churchill called the victims of the World Trade Center attacks “little Eichmanns” because of their participation in the overarching American imperial machine. The right-wing media exploded into a frenzy over Churchill’s comments and he was eventually fired for them, a professional fate that almost certainly will not befall professor Rosenbaum despite his essentially identical comments about Gazans.