Jihad Against Danish Newspaper

[channa18]

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/382




Islam is no laughing matter. The Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten is being protected by security guards and several cartoonists have gone into hiding after the newspaper published a series of twelve cartoons (see them all here, halfway the article) about the prophet Muhammad. According to the Islam it is blasphemous to make images of the prophet. Muslim fundamentalists have threatened to bomb the paper’s offices and kill the cartoonists.

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The publication led to outrage among the Muslim immigrants living in Denmark. 5,000 of them took to the streets to protest. Muslim organisations have demanded an apology, but Juste rejects this idea: “We live in a democracy. That’s why we can use all the journalistic methods we want to. Satire is accepted in this country, and you can make caricatures,” he said. The Danish imam Raed Hlayhel reacted with the statement: “This type of democracy is worthless for Muslims. Muslims will never accept this kind of humiliation. The article has insulted every Muslim in the world.”

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The affair, however, has also led to a diplomatic incident. On Thursday the ambassadors of eleven Muslim countries, including Indonesia, a number of Arab states, Pakistan, Iran, and Bosnia-Herzegovina, complained about the cartoons in a letter to Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen. They say the publication of the cartoons is a “provocation” and demand apologies from the newspaper.

Jyllands-Posten was also included on an al-Qaeda website listing possible terrorist targets. An organisation which calls itself “The Glorious Brigades in Northern Europe” is circulating pictures on the internet which show bombs exploding over pictures of the newspaper and blood flowing over the national flag of Denmark. “The Mujahedeen have numerous targets in Denmark – very soon you all will regret this,” the website says.

[channa18]

1. According to AAR, possible FATWA !!

there is a wall in their future.

[tocqueville]

2. it's not only Denmark but France and Norway too

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060202/wl_nm/religion_denmark_cartoons_dc

what the article doesn't say is that the owner of the French daily is Egyptian

[barb162]

6. yes, isn't that an interesting tidbit

[TallahasseeGrannie]

3. When cultures collide...

[pelsar]

4. and then comes a decision.....

the conflict is base on fundementally different cultures:

since one has to "give"......which one, the freedom of ideas and the constant arguments complaints involving those ideas or blanket intolerence?

which? there is no middle ground here, one culture has to let go of a fundemental aspect of its culture.

[TallahasseeGrannie]

5. You nailed it.

How to decide? Country of birth? I have no answers.

[rememberauschwitz]

11. "how to decide"

I think it's fairly easy to decide: tolerance does not include violence against others.

There is a story -- probably apocryphal -- about an English officer in India during the days of the Raj. He came across a Suttee -- a wife burning ceremony -- and moved to have it halted. The men carrying out the Suttee complained that it was their religious tradition, which the English were bound to respect. The officer responded that just as some Hindus had a tradition of burning wives, the English had a tradition of hanging wife burners.

That kind of strikes the right balance to me.

[smirkymonkey]

9. The visiting culture should respect the host culture.

Otherwise, they should leave.

[Violet_Crumble]

14. Thank you Samuel Huntington n/t

[barb162]

7. Do those giving out death threats get to rule the day?

[channa18]

10. Spooky, isnt it ??

But the answer is apparently yes .

[Boojatta]

8. "The affair, however, has also led to a diplomatic incident."

"On Thursday the ambassadors of eleven Muslim countries, including Indonesia, a number of Arab states, Pakistan, Iran, and Bosnia-Herzegovina, complained about the cartoons in a letter to Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen."

Don't they realize that if cartoons can be outlawed then the Koran itself can be outlawed?

[IndianaGreen]

12. Anti-Muslim cartoons: An ugly and calculated provocation

European media publish anti-Muslim cartoons: An ugly and calculated provocation

By the Editorial Board
4 February 2006

The World Socialist Web Site unequivocally condemns the publication by a series of European newspapers of defamatory cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad as a terrorist and killer. These crude caricatures, intended to insult and incite Muslim sensibilities, are a political provocation. Their publication, initially by a right-wing Danish newspaper with historical ties to German and Italian fascism, was calculated to fuel anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant sentiment.

The decision of the right-wing Danish government to defend the newspaper that initially published the cartoons, and of newspapers in Norway, France, Germany, Spain, Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Iceland and Hungary, both conservative and liberal, to reprint them has nothing to do with freedom of the press or the defense of secularism. Such claims make a mockery of these democratic principles.

The promulgation of such bigoted filth is, rather, bound up with a shift by the European ruling elites to line up more squarely behind the neo-colonial interventions of US imperialism in the Middle East and Central Asia. It is no accident that it occurs in the midst of the ongoing slaughter in Iraq, new threats against the Palestinian masses, and the preparations to launch sanctions, and eventual military aggression, against Iran.

It is, moreover, a continuation and escalation of a deliberate policy in Europe, spearheaded by the political right and aided and abetted by the nominal “left” parties, to demonize the growing Muslim population, isolate it, and use it as a scapegoat for the growing social misery affecting broad layers of the working class.

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/feb2006/cart-f04.shtml

[Violet_Crumble]

13. Caricature of a freedom

EDITORS make decisions to censor the news every day. To exclude material that is offensive, distressing, biased or just too dull is not necessarily an affront to freedom of speech. It is a very fine line to tread and no part is finer, perhaps, than the knife-edge between satire and insult. Gauging potential audience reaction is no longer just a matter of understanding the local community a media organisation serves. Instant global communication means inflammatory news whips its way around the world so fast that reason can be left languishing on the blocks, long after the angry mobs have taken to the streets.

The Herald will not publish the controversial Danish cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad. This is not a sop to those bent on exploiting the cartoons to justify their outrageous, and disproportionate, acts of violence. Those extremists torching Western embassies and glorifying terrorism crave any confrontation which will bolster their anti-Western position. But the self-serving agenda of extremists should not be confused with the genuine offence caused to other Muslims around the world. We know it is offensive to Muslims to portray the prophet Muhammad in any way, let alone as a damning terrorist stereotype. We also know that tarring all Muslims with the same terrorist brush dangerously stokes tensions, especially in Western societies with Muslim minorities. Sydney does not need to be reminded of the Cronulla riots. The Herald will publish descriptions of the cartoons and an internet link. But just as we do not need to publish pornographic images to debate pornography, we do not need to amplify the offence by publishing the cartoons.

Freedom of speech should be reinforced and promoted, but there are far finer causes to uphold than the right to lampoon Islam. Nor is freedom of speech without proper limits: it is not a licence to incite hatred or violence. Outdated national media codes and anti-vilification laws have little clout in the borderless domain of cyberspace. In cyberspace there lurks material to offend us all. The most effective response may be to see the cartoons for what they are: crude, poorly drawn, not funny and undeserving of such attention.

http://www.smh.com.au/editorial/index.html?page=2

I've bolded the sentence that I think quite a few DUers in recent days need to take a bit of notice of...

Violet...