The State Department’s definition of “terrorism” is pretty explicit:

(1) the term “international terrorism” means terrorism involving citizens or the territory of more than one country;
(2) the term “terrorism” means premeditated, politically motivated violence perpetrated against non-combatant targets by subnational groups or clandestine agents; and
(3) the term “terrorist group” means any group practicing, or which has significant subgroups which practice, international terrorism.

What is key is the motivation

(B) appear to be intended—

(i) to intimidate or coerce a civilian population;
(ii) to influence the policy of a government by intimidation or coercion; or
(iii) to affect the conduct of a government by mass destruction, assassination, or kidnapping; and

(C) occur primarily outside the territorial jurisdiction of the United States, or transcend national boundaries in terms of the means by which they are accomplished, the persons they appear intended to intimidate or coerce, or the locale in which their perpetrators operate or seek asylum;

At least that was the case up until yesterday when the Obama administration officially aligned itself with Muslim extremists and labeled Israel as have committed acts of terrorism:

QUESTION: All right, this will be very brief. I understand that you have decided now how to qualify the stabbing attack on the Palestinians in Dimona?

MR KIRBY: Yes, we’ve had a chance to look at that attack more deeply, and I think you’re going to ask me what – do we consider it an act of terrorism. And we do.

QUESTION: You do consider it an act of terrorism. Okay, so that would suggest then that you believe that this is – that both sides are, in fact, committing these —

MR KIRBY: Well, I would say certainly individuals on both sides of this divide are – have proven capable of and in our view guilty of acts of terror.

QUESTION: All right. And then the visit to Temple Mount/Haram al-Sharif by Israelis, is that – does the Administration consider that to be visits to there – does the Administration consider that to be incitement?

MR KIRBY: I’m not going to be able to characterize every single act with terminology. What the Secretary has said and stands by is that we want to see the status quo restored, the status quo arrangement there on Haram al-Sharif and the Temple Mount, and for both sides to take actions to de-escalate the tensions. So incitement can take many forms. Again, I’m not going to – I’m not going to go through a laundry list of what is or what isn’t. I mean, the Secretary spoke specifically about incitement yesterday, and we recognize that incitement can go both ways here. But it’s the – whether it’s action or rhetoric, it’s things that encourage others to continue this cycle of violence, it’s just not helpful and not going to get us to what we really want to see there.

QUESTION: Is it the Administration’s position that the status quo at the Temple Mount has been broken?

MR KIRBY: Well, certainly, the status quo has not been observed, which has led to a lot of the violence.

The incident this Kirby guy is calling terrorism was actually a revenge attack carried out in retribution for other attacks on Israelis.

Three Palestinian construction workers and one West Bank Bedouin were stabbed Friday morning in the southern city of Dimona by a Jewish assailant, in a suspected revenge attack that comes after a string of terror attacks and clashes in Israel and the West Bank. The suspected attacker was arrested on the scene, after first stabbing the Bedouin.

Shortly thereafter, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu strongly condemned the attack, saying violence against innocent Arabs is unacceptable. “Israel is a country of law and order,” he said. “We bring anyone to justice who commits acts of violence, on either side, Jew or Arab.”

Note what is different here? Unlike the Palestinian Authority that blatantly supports attacks on Israelis, the Israeli who attacked was denounced and arrested. What is most important is that one person cannot, by the definition itself, act to intimidate a civilian population. Unsurprisingly, you find folks who are anti-Semitic, anti-Israel, and, it seems, self-hating, who claim that the word “individuals” makes the statement correct.

The StateDept Spox did NOT accuse Israel of committing acts of terror, only “individuals”. http://t.co/uuoszz2PcS pic.twitter.com/VA8AcBwaz9

— David Shor (@IshYimini) October 15, 2015

It doesn’t. One man cannot, by himself, be a terrorist. He has to be acting on behalf of a larger cause. And there is no evidence of any concerted effort in Israel to either intimidate Muslims or drive them out of Israel.

But the Obama administration, in its obsession to blame Israel for everything from crop failure to gential chancres, instantly classified this knife assault as terrorism simply to create a moral equality between the obvious terrorism of Palestinians and the legitimate actions of Israel.

Not content with this, the State Department went on to lay the blame for the current violence INSIDE Israel upon Israel.

At some point I expect to see Obama walk into the Rose Garden with a Pizza Hut table cloth wrapped about his head and carrying an AirSoft gun and proclaim an Intifada against Israel himself.