The trial of seven animal rights activists under domestic terrorism laws focuses attention on a threat which law enforcement officials say has become greater than that of the Ku Klux Klan, neo-Nazis, and right-wing militias.

Defendants in the federal trial in New Jersey, which has just begun and is expected to last into August, are charged with conspiracy and interstate stalking involving the vandalism and harassment of employees of labs that use animals to test drugs and chemicals.

Officials say this is part of a growing trend that in recent years has included more than 1,200 incidents of arson, bombings, theft, animal releases, vandalism, and office takeovers. Targets of what activists call "direct actions" have included laboratories, mink ranches, SUV dealerships, fast-food outlets, and new housing developments. Damages have totaled hundreds of millions of dollars.

"We have seen an escalation in violent rhetoric and tactics," John Lewis, the FBI's deputy assistant director for counterterrorism, told a Senate hearing recently. "Attacks are also growing in frequency and size. Harassing phone calls and vandalism now coexist with improvised explosive devices and personal threats to employees."

The FBI currently has 150 pending investigations involving 35 agency field offices working with other law enforcement agencies on such cases. "The FBI and its partners have made a number of high-profile arrests of individuals involved with animal rights extremism or ecoterrorism," Mr. Lewis told lawmakers.

A federal judge in California recently ruled that William Jensen Cottrell, a graduate student in physics at the California Institute of Technology, should serve at least seven years in federal prison and pay more than $3.5 million in restitution for firebombing more than 100 sport utility vehicles at dealerships and homes near Los Angeles.

Activists reject the "ecoterrorist" label, a controversial phrase coined by those who tend to be critical of anything (or anybody) involved with environmental activism.

Likening their activity to that of the anti-Nazi resistance in Europe or the underground railroad helping slaves escape the South, activists say that those carrying out the attacks take "all necessary precautions against harming any animal, human and non-human."

It may be true that, unlike such right-wing domestic terrorists as Timothy McVeigh and Eric Rudolph, they have not been responsible for any loss of life - other than the odd mink that's been "liberated" into the tooth-and-claw world of nature and would have been killed for its fur anyway.

Still, some animal rights and environmental extremists are ratcheting up their threats. One is quoted as saying, "If someone is killing, on a regular basis, thousands of animals, and if that person can only be stopped in one way by the use of violence, then it is certainly a justifiable solution."

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