by Don Feder

About the author: Don Feder, a nationally syndicated columnist, is the author of Who’s Afraid of the Religious Right" and A Jewish Conservative Looks at Pagan America.

On Oct. 7, 2001, the United States began bombing military installations and terrorist training camps in Afghanistan to avenge those who died in the attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. To call them victims of terrorism is too narrow a focus. In fact, they fell in the course of a world war—whose other casualties include Jews, Hindus, Orthodox Serbs and Indonesian Christians.

It’s hard for ordinary Americans to understand the nature of the struggle when our leaders cling to a Disney version of Islam. President George W. Bush assures us that “the terrorists practice a fringe...