DEFINING TERRORISM WITHOUT APOLOGY

And, another author wades in on the blown divide and conquer opportunity for the terrorists.

You are way ahead of them...you read it here two days ago.

Why was the United Nations headquarters in Iraq, of all places, bombed yesterday? Well, why did a suicide bomber blow himself up inside a crowded Jerusalem bus last night? That the first question is a mystery to many while the second is seen to be too obvious to ask illustrates both how the war against terrorism is misunderstood and how it must be fought.

The UN is not supposed to have enemies. Who could be against its humanitarian mission, or as its slain representative, Sergio Vieira de Mello, expressed its goal, ''to make sure that the interests of the Iraqi people come first?''

But all this speculation misses the point, just as it does when the United States or Israel is attacked. The objective of the terrorists is to make us think what we have done wrong, to wonder what we have done to provoke such a heinous crime. And the answer is always the same. It is not what we, the U.S., or the U.N. has done wrong, but who we are and what we have done right.

There are two simple lessons from the suicide bombings yesterday in Baghdad and Jerusalem: No one is safe and there is no turning back. Suicide terrorism is the plague of this century. It cannot be escaped, denied, or appeased. It must be defeated.

So far, the terrorists have successfully played divide and conquer. They have first succeeded in convincing the world that terrorism against Israel, while condemnable, is somehow understandable, and that it can be addressed by delivering on supposed ''root causes,'' such as the call for a Palestinian state. They have also lulled the world into thinking that only those who stand up to them, such as the U.S. and Israel, will be attacked, while those who are willing to resist the war against terrorism will be spared.

Terrorism will be beaten when these twin myths are dispelled.