When peace activist Medea Benjamin stepped to the podium at the annual New Jersey Peace Action dinner yesterday, she already was known as co-founder of the human rights organization Global Exchange and the women’s anti-war group CODEPINK.Yesterday, Benjamin received another title: terrorist.

“The original Medea murdered her children,” read one protest sign outside The Regency House hotel on Route 23 in Pompton Plains, where the dinner was held. “Medea Benjamin is murdering ours.”

Some 18 people from groups that oppose anti-war protests as “anti-American” hoisted signs condemning CODEPINK as supporting terrorism.

Perlson dismissed the 250 dinner attendees as “terrorists,” but Benjamin said that is “misguided.”

“We get calls and e-mails from people in the military every day saying, ‘Thank-you. We want to come home,’” Benjamin said.

But Benjamin admits she has a “soft spot” for the protesters. “I feel I have more in common with them than I do with most Americans,” Benjamin said.