The Muslim World Erupts Over Danish Cartoons
4 Feb 2006
Fatwas are flying everywhere. The Muslim world is again up in arms. Throat slitting blades are being sharpened and the jugulars of cartoonists threatened by jihadists. “What’s caused all of the uproar?” you ask. Merely this, a Danish newspaper ran cartoon caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed, which have been subsequently reprinted by newspapers all over Europe.
While I must admit my inability to see the Prophet Mohammed as an appropriate subject for the funny pages of newspapers; after all, there’s nothing funny about a guy who starts a religion that you must either convert to or be decapitated by, I can’t go along with yesterday’s sermon at Gaza’s Al Omari mosque. The preacher there told a huge Muslim rally, “We will not accept less than severing the heads of those responsible.” The crowd, however, appears to have been in a more merciful mood, calling only for the amputation of the cartoonist’s hands. Elsewhere in Gaza, armed militants surrounded European Union offices threatening to kidnap foreigners unless the offending European nations issued official apologies.
It appears Europe is beginning to tap its toe to the Muslims’ tune. The commencement of Europe’s backpedaling to another strong jihadist’s shove may be attributed to the following: Gaza militants and their demands, Indonesian Muslims going on a rampage inside the Jakarta building that houses the Danish Embassy, bomb threats against the Danish newspaper that initially published the cartoons, the removing of Danish goods from store shelves throughout the Muslim world, the kidnapping of a German from a Nablus hotel on the West Bank, Saudi Arabia and Syria recalling their ambassadors from Denmark, and more than 300 rallying Islamic students in Pakistan chanting “Death to Denmark!” and “Death to France!”
After receiving two bomb threats, the Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper that first published the cartoons of Mohammed, apologized for hurting Muslims’ feelings. It’s amazing how sensitive one becomes to the feelings of others while under a bomb scare. The French Soir, the only newspaper in France to reprint the Danish cartoons, fired its managing editor. Then, in an effort to prove itself to the Muslim world as an equal opportunity blasphemer, the French paper ran caricatures of Christ and Christian clergymen. Interestingly, the French government chided the paper for its insensitivity toward Muslims, but never said a word about the paper’s insensitivity toward Christians. I guess if we want folks becoming as sensitive to our feelings as they are to the feelings of Muslims then we’re going to have to get into this fatwa thing.
Major newspapers in America, such as The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times and The Chicago Tribune, have refused to print the cartoons of Mohammed. According to Robert Christie, a spokesman for The Wall Street Journal, his paper “didn’t want to publish anything that can be perceived as inflammatory.” Doesn’t it make you feel good to know that Islam is getting the same “fair” and “sensitive” treatment from the American press that Christianity enjoys?
Finally, let me offer some advice to the Danish cartoonist who drew the caricatures of Mohammed, as well as a suggested addition to the prayer lists of my brothers and sisters in Christ. First, if you are the Danish cartoonist now being sought by throat slitting Muslims you should contact Salman Rushdie, the author of The Satanic Verses. Anyone who has kept his head for so long with so many headhunters after him has to know some good hideaways and hiding places. Second, let me encourage all my fellow-Christians to join me in praying that the National Endowment of the Arts will never produce any artwork on Mohammed, like they have on Jesus. If they ever do, World War III will breakout.
Don Walton
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