Florida Sen. Bob Graham's opposition to the war in Iraq came under fire Tuesday from Connecticut Sen. Joseph Lieberman, a rival for the Democratic presidential nomination, who said war critics make their party appear weak on defense.

Lieberman's comments came one day after he delivered a foreign policy address accusing his antiwar rivals of sending out a message that they ``don't know a just war when they see it.''

He repeated those exact words during a Hollywood press conference, citing by name former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, Ohio Rep. Dennis Kucinich and the Rev. Al Sharpton as his targets.

When a reporter asked, Lieberman reluctantly said Graham was a target, as well.

But the Connecticut senator said in an interview later that he put Graham in a ''separate category'' because of Graham's reasoning: that the war in Iraq took the nation's attention and resources off the broader war on terrorism.

''I disagree with his conclusion, respectfully,'' Lieberman told The Herald. ``I think we're strong enough to do both. And in fact, a victory over Saddam has helped us in the war against terrorism.''

Graham, the only senator in the race to vote against the resolution giving President Bush the authority to go to war with Iraq, said in a telephone interview Tuesday that the positions taken by Lieberman and other war advocates have let terrorist groups such as Hezbollah, al Qaeda and the Islamic Jihad flourish.

Graham, the former chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, had unsuccessfully sponsored an amendment allowing Bush to take military action against the terrorists, as well.

''My objection to the resolution to go to war was not that it was too strong but that it was too timid, and took our focus off the principal enemy of the American people,'' Graham said.

''I don't understand what Joe's motivations are,'' Graham added. ``I understand that politics is an issue of competition, but it should be a reasoned competition.''

Lieberman's comments fall in line with the theme of this week's national conference of the centrist Democratic Leadership Council, whose top officials say Dean's popularity among liberal activists could hamper the party in the general election hunt for suburban swing voters.