For the record: Targeted Killings Are OK (at least when done by the US)

AP reports:

Opening up a visible new front in the war on terror, U.S. forces launched a pinpoint missile strike in Yemen, killing a top al-Qaida operative in his car in the first such overt attack outside of Afghanistan (news - web sites), a U.S. official said.

The strike, believed to have been conducted by a CIA (news - web sites) aircraft, killed Qaed Salim Sinan al-Harethi, the official said, speaking on condition of anonymity. U.S. counterterrorism officials say al-Harethi was al-Qaida's chief operative in Yemen and a suspect in the October 2000 bombing of the destroyer USS Cole (news - web sites).

Al-Harethi's car was struck by a Hellfire air-to-ground missile. The CIA launches Hellfires from pilotless Predator aircraft. Five other people, believed low-level al-Qaida operatives, also were killed.

Recall that when Israel used the very same anti-terrorism method, she was pilloried by one and all, including the US, for "targeted killing". Israel’s critics seem to believe, as the Romans used to say, that quod licet Iovi, non licet bovi (“what is permitted to Jupiter is not permitted to a cow”)...

Contributed by Joseph Alexander Norland