Yesterday’s attack in the shadow of the World Trade Center that left eight people dead and 12 was “an act of terror and a particularly cowardly act of terror aimed at innocent civilians,” said Mayor Bill de Blasio of the gruesome handiwork of Sayfullo Habibulaevic Saipov, an Uzbekstani national who emigrated to the United States seven years ago.

Saipov survived being shot by a police officer after he mowed down his victims with a rented truck. He underwent surgery and remains in police custody.

The attack is said to be the largest terrorist act committed in the United States since the al Qaeda-directed Sept. 11, 2001 suicide attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon that claimed 2,996 lives.

Leid Stories, however, asks: Are these acts of terror or something else?