According to The Brussels Journal, Mullah Krekar, the alleged leader of Ansar al-Islam who has been living as a refugee in Norway since 1991 has said that the publication of the Jyllands Posten Muhammend cartoons amounts to a declaration of war.

“The war has begun,” he told Norwegian journalists. Mr Krekar said Muslims in Norway are preparing to fight. “It does not matter if the governments of Norway and Denmark apologize, the war is on.”

The Brussels Journal also notes that Islamist organisations worldwide have started issuing threats against Europeans. Hizbollah has announced that is preparing suicide attacks in Denmark and Norway and that a senior imam in Kuwait, Nazem al-Masbah, has said that those who have published cartoons of Muhammad should be murdered. Al-Masbah also threatened all citzens of all countries where the cartoons have been published (see here, here and here and see the full set of cartoons here).

Spiegel quotes Mahmoud Zahar, one of the leaders of Hamas who told the Italian newspaper Il Giornale that the cartoons were an “unforgivable insult” that should be punished with death. “We should have killed all those who offend the Prophet and instead here we are, protesting peacefully,” he said.

In Gaza on Saturday, hundreds of Palestinians took to the streets in protests and stormed a number of European buildings including the German culture center and the European Commission building in Gaza City.

And in the UK, MediaWatchWatch reports that the recently formed Al Ghurabaa group has called for those who “insult Muhammad” to be killed.

Pakistan’s foreign ministry has called in the envoys of nine Western countries - France, Germany, Italy, Spain, Switzerland, The Netherlands, Hungary, Norway and the Czech Republic - to protest at the publication of the cartoons in those countries.

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has ordered his commerce minister to examine the feasibility of cancelling all trade contracts with countries whose media had published the cartoons. He claimed that the pictures show the “impudence and rudeness” of western newspapers.

The Vatican has also decided to get involved, calling the cartoons an “unacceptable provocation,” and insisting that freedom of thought and expression “cannot entail the right to offend the religious sentiment of believers.”

EU Trade Commissioner, Peter Mandelson, has criticised the papers that have published the cartoons , accusing them of “throwing petrol onto the flames of the original issue and the original offence that was taken.” Egyptian President, Hosni Mubarak, has claimed that the decision to republish the cartoons could encourage terrorists - and he probably also thinks that women who wear short skirts encourage rapists. And UN Secretary General, Kofi Annan is said to be “worried” about the issue - his pokesman said that Mr Annan believes freedom of expression should always be used with respect for religion - which, quite frankly, is a meaningless disclaimer.

In France, however, interior minister Nicolas Sarkozy is taking a more robust approach, reminding us that: “Freedom of expression is not an issue for negotiation and I see no reason to give one religion a special treatment.”

German Chancellor, Angela Merkel, has expressed understanding for the offence taken by Muslims. However, she also pointed out that “Freedom of the press is one of the great assets as a component of democracy, but we also have the value and asset of freedom of religion.”

And the Danish People’s Party wants to seriously consider the possibility of expelling imams who do not have Danish citizenship and who have harmed Danish interests in the Middle East by feeding the Arab media with false information. The initiative is backed by Prime Minister Rasmussen’s Liberal Party (Venstre).

Elsewhere, MediaWatchWatch asks “So you’re offended. So fucking what?”

Before you picket a theatre, write to your local paper, fire your AK-47 in the air, or call for someone’s head on a plate, ask yourself this question. Can you give an honest and coherent answer, explaining why your personal hurt feelings take precedence over someone else’s freedom?

Because you need to have an answer to this question. And it has to be a good one. Otherwise you will just be dismissed as an irrational, immature cry-baby with an inflated sense of the importance of your own sensibilities.

They also note that there is now a Wikipedia entry on the whole affair.

Pickled Politics also has a pretty balanced take on the whole affair:

If all religions were companies, Islam would be the one with the worst public relations department.

The original moral high-ground has been lost to the noise made by the gunmen, rampaging mobs and hysterical nutters.

And they quote Indigo Jo, who saw the march outside the Danish Embassy.

There, I set about telling various journalists, and some who were not journalists, that the core of the people across the road were in fact “serial demonstrators” who have a history of attending other people’s demonstrations, shouting slogans largely unrelated to the issue at hand, and casting a bad light over both Islam itself and the demonstration.

Muslim group blog, ‘Aqoul points out that

“Islam” is a concept, not a agent. Thus it’s not “Islam” that forbids anything, but the (human) authorities on Islamic law. And, it’s not the “depiction of the religion’s founder Muhammad” that is forbidden, but either the depiction of any of God’s creatures (but particularly humans) OR the slander of a prophet - be it Muhammad or Moses or Jesus or Abraham, etc. Slandering a prophet would, however not fall under something like “slander” or “hate crime”, but actually be seen as “kufr”, i.e. unbelief/apostasy, as the assertion that a prophet was anything but a noble man . Of course, that only applies to Muslims. There is no provisio in Islamic law how to deal with non-Muslims who disparage a prophet, as they already are unbelievers. Also, the legal authorities in the Muslim world are quite unanimous in their verdict(s) that Muslims living in non-Muslim polities (i.e., states) should adhere to the law of the one in which they reside or travel.

and that

The whole “boycotting Danish companies” thing has, in my opinion, a lot to do with inability to differentiate between a newspaper in Denmark, and/or a company that is headquartered in Denmark, and the Danish government. In a country where the government either owns all media or, at least, heavily controls and censors all media, it is hard for the population to imagine a newspaper, or a radio/television station, that is independent from government influence and control. Similar, in a place where national identity and pride is pushed to the forefront of public life, and where the differences between political establishment and private enterprise are blurred, at best, it is hard to see a company that is headquartered in Denmark NOT as a “Danish company”.

‘Aqoul also asks Why do the Syrians burn embassies but the Iranians don’t?

Doesn’t anybody find it at least noteworthy that the Danish & Norwegian embassies were torched in - out of all places - Damascus? That there were only small demonstrations in Cairo? That there were almost no demonstrations at all in Iran? That the number of Muslim demonstrators in Europe was - given the overall numbers of Muslim inhabitants - ridiculously low?

I cannot answer all those questions. But the main issue at hand - that the protests have ALSO to be understood in their local/regional contexts - seems to be more important than most, if not all, of the commentators so far have realized. And at least in the region about which I do know a bit, the picture is a very complex one.

It’s an interesting and sober anaysis and one that I recommend that you read.

Die Welt also points out that:

Syria is a totalitarian state and not even a mosquito can land on a shoulder without prior approval of one of the secret services.

My Persian friend told me that he thinks it is virtually impossible to fire those buildings if the regime doesn’t allow it - I think we may conclude that this is a message of the Syrian government to the West (think about Hariri, ‘regime change’, Iran).

And in Index on Censorship, Muslim broadcaster & commentator, Kenan Malik argues that it is both inevitable and important that people offend the sensibilities of others.

But in the real world, where societies are plural, then it is both inevitable and important that people offend the sensibilities of others. Inevitable because where different beliefs are deeply held, clashes are unavoidable and we should deal with those clashes rather than suppress them.

Important because any kind of social change or social progress means offending some deeply held sensibilities. ‘If liberty means anything,’ George Orwell once wrote, ‘it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.’

Not to give offence would mean not to pursue change. Imagine what Galileo, Voltaire, Paine or Mill would have made of Ian Jack’s argument that one should not depict things that may cause offence. Imagine he’d lived 700 years ago and had said, ‘In principle it’s right to depict the earth orbiting the sun, but imagine the immeasurable insult that the exercise of such a right would cause…’

The Scotsman quotes UK cartoonist Martin Rowson on the issue:

“This is a typical example of religious leaders using the excuse of being offended to go on the attack and to make themselves immune to any kind of criticism. Some followers of Islam are insist-ing on a monopoly of being offended. I am just as offended by their taking offence.”

Christopher Hitchens goes further:

The prohibition on picturing the prophet—who was only another male mammal—is apparently absolute. So is the prohibition on pork or alcohol or, in some Muslim societies, music or dancing. Very well then, let a good Muslim abstain rigorously from all these. But if he claims the right to make me abstain as well, he offers the clearest possible warning and proof of an aggressive intent.

And in Spiked, Munira Mirza observes that:

Press freedom is the foundation of a free society. People don’t always like what they hear or see - if it challenges their cherished beliefs, it can hurt. It might also be dangerous, as the experiences of Theo van Gogh, the murdered Dutch filmmaker and journalists operating in repressive societies such as Iran, Saudi Arabia and China, demonstrate. It might also be expensive, as Danish producers and manufacturers are discovering with the boycott of their goods. But no matter the price, the principle must be defended. Unless we stand up for freedom of speech, we are unable to engage freely and hold belief systems - of all kinds - to account. Unfortunately, too many politicians and journalists are unwilling to make this stand, wanting above all a quiet (and safe) life.

It is important to bear in mind that this controversy became both violent and international after a group of Danish Muslim leaders and imams took a 43 page report to the Middle East to “explain” how offensive the cartoons are in January. The report included not only the Jyllands Posten cartoons, but an extra three that had never been published - or even seen - before.

It is equally important to recognise, again, that there are still a number of Muslims of great courage - not all of them moderate - who are taking a stand against this artificial controversy.

In Jordan, Jihad al-Momani, the editor of independent tabloid al-Shihan (sorry, can’t find a link), published three of the twelve cartoons to show what the issue was about. In an editorial entitled “Muslims of the world, be reasonable,” al-Momani pointed out that that Jyllands Posten had apologised for offending Muslim sensibilities and deplored the fact that few in the Muslim world were willing to listen to this.

“What brings more prejudice against Islam, these caricatures or pictures of a hostage-taker slashing the throat of his victim in front of the cameras or a suicide bomber who blows himself up during a wedding ceremony in Amman?”

He was sacked for his efforts and, according to Die Welt, arrested.

The Brussels Journal also links to the website of the Arab-European League whose leader, Dyab Abu Jahjah argues:

The debate on freedom of speech in this is not what interests me. On that level I do also believe that one must be able of publishing and saying anything. I do not believe in red lines, and I do not believe that anything should be above the freedom of human expression. I know that most Arabs and Muslims would disagree with me on this point, but this is not what bothers me, what bothers me is that most Europeans don’t realize that they also disagree with me.

He goes on to claim that “Muslims and others in Europe can not say everything they often want to say and they risk being arrested and prosecuted if they do. Muslims and other religious people can not express their disgust from homosexuality and clearly state that they believe it’s a sickness and a deviation without being persecuted for being homophobic.” The AEL have launched a cartoon campaign which seeks to “break Taboos and cross all the red lines.”

A number of European Muslim leaders have also joined the call for calm. Nadeem Elyas, head of Germany’s Central Council of Muslims, expressed outrage over the comics on Friday, but called for protests to remain peaceful and French Muslim groups are investigating whether they can sue France Soir, which published them on Thursday.

The Brussels Journal reports that a network of moderate Muslims has been established in Denmark with the hope of creating a Danish form of Islam to act as a counterweight to the Danish imams inciting the Islamic world against the country.

Also in Denmark, two moderate Danish imams, Fatih Alev and Abdul Wahid Pedersen, have defended Danish values in an interview with the Saudi newspaper Arab News, urging for a settlement in the cartoon affair. They stressed that Jyllands-Posten had apologized for offending Muslims, that the Danish press is not under government control, that Muslims in Denmark are generally well treated, and that the boycott of Danish products in the Middle East also harms Danish Muslims.

On the Gaza strip, Gunmen associated with the Fatah Party passed out carnations at a Catholic and old the Associated Press they were there to apologize for the actions of other Fatah gunmen who had warned that churches would become targets of their protests. “We came to show that we are united, Muslims and Christians, and that we oppose assaulting our Christian brothers,” one of the gunmen said.

On Friday in Iraq, Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the country’s top Shia Muslim cleric, condemned the publication of the cartoons, but added that militant Islamists were partly to blame for distorting the image of Islam. Ayatollah Sistani criticized Muslim extremists for distorting the view of Islam in the West through their violent actions.

In Indonesia, Die Welt reports that, following the shootings of six Christians in a farm in Patikul, Mindanao (six dead, five seriously wounded), demonstrations against the cartoons have virtually come to a stop. Demonstrators who planned to denounce the cartoons changed their slogans and corrected their posters and banners to: ‘Islam loves Jesus’ and ‘No killing in the name of the Prophet.’

Maybe even extremists can go too far.

Trackback this Post | Feed on comments to this Post