I'm closing this. I read the entire thread and, as usual, I'm conflicted between crying and laughing about how horribly some people are informed by serious matters like this and are by no means qualified to participate in the discussions about the topic, but somehow are under the illusion they are and even think they are an authority on the matter.
The attack on Charlie Hebdo and the hostages that followed it were beyond all reasonable doubt terrorist attacks. There is no discussion there, there is no debate there, it's a hardcore truth and fact. That's the reality of the situation. Anyone who denies or disagrees with that is in complete denial and should keep his/her mouth shut for his/her own good. If they just wanted to punish Charlie Hebdo, if they just wanted to simply murder them as some people say in this thread, why the hell didn't they just assassinate them quietly by picking them off one by one? People die under mysterious circumstances all the time. It shouldn't be that hard for them to just kill the cartoonists and make it look like a failed robbery or make it appear someone else did it. Charlie Hebdo had no shortage of enemies. If their point was simply to punish them for their deeds, they could have done it in a far more efficient way without hurting innocent people and above all without discrediting -again- the Muslim faith. This is what Israel did with escaped Nazi's.
But no that's not what they did. In total 20 people died. Excluding the 3 terrorists themselves who died dog's deaths, 17 people died of which many were innocent people who had nothing to do with Charlie Hebdo whatsoever, including a cop that was a Muslim himself. So how the hell is this just plain murder and a punishment for Charlie Hebdo? Are some of you people really so extremely naive to think that if CH had apologized or had never made those cartoons, nothing would have happened? Oh please get a reality check. If it wasn't CH, they would have used another target. Just living in Europe or America alone is enough reason for them to pull stuff like this. That CH was this time around the victim because they made cartoons, was just a feeble excuse to attack them specifically. They would have attacked someone or something either way. Why? Because the point of this attacks is to sow fear. Terror literally means fear in Latin. I mean France has a population of over 60 million and they killed 17 of them. Statistically that's peanuts, almost a laughable joke. But the result is that France has been almost burning for 3 days. Why? Because they kill innocent people randomly, they show that they have no morals, that they have no hesitation whatsoever to commit gruesome, inhumane acts. That's why this is a terrorist attack. Charlie Hebdo was nothing more than a superficial layer, a frame work, a box that contained what truly was the point: they wanted to hurt their enemies and their enemies are everyone who do not bow to their tyrannical views. They could easily have used another box. They would have never gotten this result if they silently assassinated the cartoonists. That would have lacked all impact. Isreal aimed specifically at individual nazi's, they wanted to make them pay for the deeds they personally were responsible for. This is not what they wanted, they wanted to make all their enemies bleed, this was on the level of a society and not and individual, Charlie Hebdo simply was the one who literally had to take the bullet.
And for crying out loud these attacks were even claimed by notorious terrorist organizations whose national sports are raping, murdering and suicide-bombing. How is it possible that some of you are so out of the loop to even deny that.
And FYI terrorism is linked with Islam because these days nut-job Muslim extremists are responsible for the most severe terrorist attacks, hence the two are strongly tied with each other. As a result it's inevitable that some people will automatically blame Islam as a whole, but there are also many who don't. So people who ignore the latter, but emphasize the first, are no better than those same people. Also most of you people don't seem to be aware that not even a few decades ago terrorism was associated with Europe where organizations like the ETA and RAF were also committing terrorist attacks on European soil. There was simply a 'shift', just like how in the 19th century you had a large group of anarchists who committed terrorist-like attacks. At some point the connection between Islam and terrorism will shift likewise.
Lastly situations like these are 'grey zones', there are no clear boundaries. However many people in this thread are thinking in black and white, or it's one, or it's the other and imagine boundaries where there are none. As long as you do not realize this, spare yourself and other people the trouble and do not get involved with matters like this as you're doomed to fail. It will only make matters worse as your perceptions are so screwed up from the get-go going into discussions is pointless.
