Muslim violence

[1John2_26]

In mosques throughout Palestinian cities, clerics condemned the cartoons. An imam at the Omari Mosque in Gaza City told 9,000 worshippers that those behind the drawings should have their heads cut off.

"If they want a war of religions, we are ready," Hassan Sharaf, an imam in Nablus, said in his sermon.

Why do Muslims react so violently to harmless things like "insulting and insensitive cartoons?"

Will Islam ever join the world in debate rather than reacting with violence and war?

Muslims Again Protest Muhammad Caricatures

By QASSIM ABDEL-ZAHRA, Associated Press Writer

Tens of thousands of angry Muslims marched through Palestinian cities, burning the Danish flag and calling for vengeance Friday against European countries where caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad were published.

Angry protests against the drawings were spread in the Muslim world.

In Iraq, thousands demonstrated after Friday mosque services, and the country's leading Shiite cleric denounced the drawings. About 4,500 people rallied in Basra and hundreds at a Baghdad mosque. Danish flags were burned at both demonstrations.

Muslims in Turkey, Pakistan, Indonesia and Malaysia demonstrated against the European nations whose papers published them.

The caricatures, including one depicting the Muslim prophet wearing a turban fashioned into a bomb, were reprinted in papers in Norwegian, French, German and even Jordanian after first appearing in a Danish paper in September. The drawings were republished after Muslims decried the images as insulting to their prophet. Dutch-language newspapers in Belgium and two Italian right-wing papers reprinted the drawings Friday.

Islamic law, based on clerics' interpretation of the Quran and the sayings of the prophet, forbids depiction's of the Prophet Muhammad and other major religious figures — even positive ones — to prevent idolatry. Shiite Muslim clerics differ in that they allow images of their greatest saint, Ali, the prophet's son-in-law, though not Muhammad.

Danish Prime Minister Fogh Rasmussen, in a meeting with the Egyptian ambassador, reiterated his stance that the government cannot interfere with issues concerning the press. On Monday, he said his government could not apologize on behalf of a newspaper, but that he personally "never would have depicted Muhammad, Jesus or any other religious character in a way that could offend other people."

Early Friday, Palestinian militants threw a bomb at a French cultural center in Gaza City, and many Palestinians began boycotting European goods, especially those from Denmark.

"Whoever defames our prophet should be executed," said Ismail Hassan, 37, a tailor who marched through the pouring rain along with hundreds of others in the West Bank city of Ramallah.

"Bin Laden our beloved, Denmark must be blown up," protesters in Ramallah chanted.

In mosques throughout Palestinian cities, clerics condemned the cartoons. An imam at the Omari Mosque in Gaza City told 9,000 worshippers that those behind the drawings should have their heads cut off.

"If they want a war of religions, we are ready," Hassan Sharaf, an imam in Nablus, said in his sermon.

About 10,000 demonstrators, including gunmen from the Islamic militant group Hamas firing in the air, marched through Gaza City to the Palestinian legislature, where they climbed on the roof, waving green Hamas banners.

"We are ready to redeem you with our souls and our blood our beloved prophet," they chanted. "Down, Down Denmark."

Thousands of protesters in the center of Nablus burned at least 10 Danish flags. In Jenin, about 1,500 people demonstrated, burning Danish dairy products. Hundreds protested in Jericho, and protests were held in towns throughout Gaza.

Fearing an outbreak of violence, Israel barred all Palestinians under age 45 from praying at Jerusalem's Al Aqsa Mosque compound, Islam's third holiest site.

Nevertheless, about 100 men chanting Islamic slogans and carrying a green Hamas flag demonstrated outside Jerusalem's Old City on Friday afternoon. The crowd scattered when police on horseback arrived, and some of the protesters threw rocks. Police broke up a second demonstration at Damascus Gate with tear gas and stun grenades.

In Iraq, the country's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, decried the drawings but did not call for protests.

"We strongly denounce and condemn this horrific action," he said in a statement posted on his Web site and dated Tuesday.

Al-Sistani, who wields enormous influence over Iraq's majority Shiites, made no call for protests and suggested that militant Muslims were partly to blame for distorting Islam's image.

He referred to "misguided and oppressive" segments of the Muslim community and said their actions "projected a distorted and dark image of the faith of justice, love and brotherhood."

"Enemies have exploited this ... to spread their poison and revive their old hatreds with new methods and mechanisms," he said.

The drawings were first published in September in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. The issue reignited last week after Saudi Arabia recalled its ambassador to Denmark and many European newspapers reprinted them this week.

The Jyllands-Posten had asked 40 cartoonists to draw images of the prophet. The purpose, its chief editor said, was "to examine whether people would succumb to self-censorship, as we have seen in other cases when it comes to Muslim issues."

The 12 caricatures have prompted boycotts of Danish goods, bomb threats and demonstrations in front of Danish embassies across the Islamic world. Muslims have also directed their anger at other European countries, with Palestinian gunmen briefly kidnapping a German citizen Thursday and surrounding European Union headquarters in Gaza.

Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was quoted as saying the caricatures are an attack on "our spiritual values" which have damaged efforts to establish an alliance between the Muslim world and Europe.

Hundreds of Turks emerging from mosques following Friday prayers staged demonstrations, including one in front of the Danish consulate in Istanbul.

"Hands that reach Islam must be broken," chanted a group of extremists outside the Merkez Mosque in Istanbul.

In Jakarta, Indonesia, more than 150 hardline Muslims stormed a high-rise building housing the Danish Embassy on Friday and tore down and burned the country's flag.

Pakistan's parliament unanimously voted to condemn the drawings as a "vicious, outrageous and provocative campaign" that has "hurt the faith and feelings of Muslims all over the world." About 800 people protested in Pakistan's capital, Islamabad, chanting "Death to Denmark" and "Death to France." Another rally in the southern city of Karachi drew 1,200 people.

Fundamentalist Muslims protested outside the Danish Embassy in Malaysia, chanting "Long live Islam, destroy our enemies."

British Foreign Secretary Jack Straw criticized European media outlets for republishing the caricatures as demonstrators prepared to take to the streets of London.

____

Associated Press Writers Qassim Abdul-Zahra and Sinan Salaheddin in Baghdad, Iraq; Selcan Hacaoglu in Ankara, Turkey; Benjamin Harvey in Istanbul, Turkey; Maria Sanminiatelli in Rome; Jan M. Olsen in Copenhagen, Denmark; Munir Ahmad in Islamabad, Pakistan; and Irwan Firdaus in Jakarta, Indonesia, contributed to this report.


Copyright © 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

[ENIGMA]

jcrawford:

What's wrong with telling people they are of the devil and going to hell in a free society where we are all supposed to have freedom of speech, freedom of religion and freedom of the press? That's not as intolerant as secularists telling Christians and Muslims to stay out of politics and making unconstitutional laws prohibiting their free exercise of religion in public schools and government.

Freedom of speech, religion and press which would not exist were the fundamentalist Muslims or any other fundamentalist religion granted power.

As you stated:

Only a tiny minority of Muslims have reacted violently to "insulting and insenstive" cartoons published in the secular press. The great majority of Muslims would prefer to debate the self-proclaimed right of secular newspapers to publish images of their Prophet at all, let alone defamatory "cartoons."

Publishing such cartoons is part of both freedom of speech and freedom of the press which would be summarily banned in a Muslim theocracy.

If those who object to the newspaper's right to publish at its own discretion would prefer a government more sympathetic to their concerns in this regard, they should try Iran.

[jcrawford]

Freedom of speech, religion and press which would not exist were the fundamentalist Muslims or any other fundamentalist religion granted power.

Religious groups are as entitled to some legislative power and representation in a secular goverment as any other group with civil rights protection are. If either secular or religious newspapers depicted Hillary Clinton as an abortion terrorist, they would certainly face political retribution from women claiming abortion rights.

Only a tiny minority of Muslims have reacted violently to "insulting and insenstive" cartoons published in the secular press. The great majority of Muslims would prefer to debate the self-proclaimed right of secular newspapers to publish images of their Prophet at all, let alone defamatory "cartoons."

Publishing such cartoons is part of both freedom of speech and freedom of the press which would be summarily banned in a Muslim theocracy.

Instituting religious laws which protect various religious communities from defamation in public newspapers are summarily banned in so-called secular 'people's democracies.'

If those who object to the newspaper's right to publish at its own discretion would prefer a government more sympathetic to their concerns in this regard, they should try Iran.

If secular newspaper editors continue to publish defamatory and insulting 'cartoons' of any living or deceased members of a religious community in the world, they will have forfeited their social right to publish such degrading and divisive propaganda in the future and may be heavily fined by their government for creating the social unrest and harm caused by their malicious publications.

[ENIGMA]

Freedom of speech, religion and press which would not exist were the fundamentalist Muslims or any other fundamentalist religion granted power.

Religious groups are as entitled to some legislative power and representation in a secular goverment as any other group with civil rights protection are. If either secular or religious newspapers depicted Hillary Clinton as an abortion terrorist, they would certainly face political retribution from women claiming abortion rights.

Thank you for agreeing with me on the point that religious groups in power would outlaw free speech.

The only "retribution" that the paper should worry about is that of losing paying subscribers.

Only a tiny minority of Muslims have reacted violently to "insulting and insenstive" cartoons published in the secular press. The great majority of Muslims would prefer to debate the self-proclaimed right of secular newspapers to publish images of their Prophet at all, let alone defamatory "cartoons."

Publishing such cartoons is part of both freedom of speech and freedom of the press which would be summarily banned in a Muslim theocracy.

Instituting religious laws which protect various religious communities from defamation in public newspapers are summarily banned in so-called secular 'people's democracies.'

As it should be.

Why should religious groups get any more protection in that regard than anyone else?

If those who object to the newspaper's right to publish at its own discretion would prefer a government more sympathetic to their concerns in this regard, they should try Iran.

If secular newspaper editors continue to publish defamatory and insulting 'cartoons' of any living or deceased members of a religious community in the world, they will have forfeited their social right to publish such degrading and divisive propaganda in the future and may be heavily fined by their government for creating the social unrest and harm caused by their malicious publications.

Creating social unrest?

Last I checked it was the rioting religious fanatics that were causing the unrest.

Perhaps curtailing any supposed social right to "kill infidels" would be in order?

[Dilettante]

Why do Muslims react so violently to harmless things like "insulting and insensitive cartoons?"

Blaming Bush for this is absurd.

The cartoons were published many months ago, and the outbreak of rage happens now. Obviously this is being organized and planned by some mullahs. Who hands ovet the Danish flgas to be burned? Is there a Muslim industry which produces flammable foreign flags?

Just another sign that different cultures cannot avoid clashing. The Muslims need a pope. That way we would have someone to talk to, someone to bring some order. A little reciprocity in the multiculturalist idea of respecting other cultures is sorely wanting. Freedom of speech includes offensive cartoons and is part and parcel of Western culture.

[1John2_26]

I find it amusing that Christians are mystified at the reactions of certain Muslims to the rest of the world. It wasn't so long ago that the Christian world behaved the same way.

ST88,

It was centuries and centuries ago. Geez . . . please bury your dead horse. It cannot rise either. know matter how hard you beat it.

Now Christians are the doctors of the world and feeders of the world's starving. Muslims enslave and kill all three of those kinds of people.

Ask Bono.

Or travel to Nigeria for yourself.

Christians are attacked, denigrated and insulted very single day here on this website and on NBC and every other "liberal" outlet. No suicide bombers and mass violence anywhere.

Muslims know that if debate and argument were pitted against their belief system, it wouldn't last. It has been protected by totalitarianism from start to now. The lucky part in Islam is oil or else no one would care about this violent part of the world.

[1John2_26]

Definitely your most ironic sentance to date.

Did you ever notice how both you and Islam accuse everyone else of attacking you?

Did you ever notice how your Dubya has replaced world debate with war and violence?

Did you ever notice how Christians handle the debate? How ironic that you disregard the voice of the martyrs of modern day Christianity. And of course you neglect the silencing of Christians handles politically by Christians as decent and civilized when we know our enemies wish to wipe us away.

Any Jihad edict against Richard Dawkins or the Reverend Barry Lynn or the ACLU or the Democrat party?

All haters of Christians and yet the Christians fight back with law and civility.

We use apologetics and editorial and not AK-47's and C-4 explosives to fight our enemies.

Interesting that Muslims are numbered among them; along with liberals and progressives huh?

[jcrawford]

Thank you for agreeing with me on the point that religious groups in power would outlaw free speech.

Only to the extent that secular socialists outlaw religious speech in government and public schools. Tit for tat, you know. We certainly wouldn't allow a secular 'supreme' court to decide any religious matters.

The only "retribution" that the paper should worry about is that of losing paying subscribers.

Since the secular press is the preaching arm of the secular church, they ought to lose their First Amendement and political rights like all the other churches. Besides using public schools as voting places, Christians, Jews and Muslims should vote in their churches, synagogues and mosques for their political candidates, while prozyletizing at the same time. Short of that, the clergy should be equally apportioned in all positions of social government.

Instituting religious laws which protect various religious communities from defamation in public newspapers are summarily banned in so-called secular 'people's democracies.'

As it should be.

Only in a secular dictatorship.

Why should religious groups get any more protection in that regard than anyone else?

They don't need more protection - just equal protection and civil rights under the law. If we can't discriminate on the basis of sex, race, national origin, etc, we can't hypocritically discriminate in public schools and government on the basis of religious orientation, speech and behavior either. The clergy have as much right to teach in public schools as so-called high school sex and science teachers do. At least they do in a free country.

Creating social unrest? Last I checked it was the rioting religious fanatics that were causing the unrest.

The European social secularists who published the defamatory cartoons caused the social unrest, harm and damages, and should be held liable by the both the people and the government. Who do you blame for riots? The people, or the governments which cause them? Remember the Boston Tea Party and the French and Russian Revolutions? Let's have some more democracies of the people.

Perhaps curtailing any supposed social right to "kill infidels" would be in order?

We already have social, civil and religious laws against killing the innocent. What do you want? Special laws against killing infidels? What about Christians, Jews and Muslims? Shouldn't there be special laws written to protect them also? How about restricting the state from authorizing the slaughter of unborn Christian, Jewish and Muslim children in their mother's womb, without first getting permission from the rest of the religious community?

[jcrawford]

The Muslims need a pope. That way we would have someone to talk to, someone to bring some order.

Are you admitting that socialist secular governments can't talk to Muslim leaders in their own countries or include them in the role of national self- government? How many Catholic, Jewish or Protestant clergy are in postions of government in Europe these days, btw? How are the values, traditions and rights of religious people represented in a secular socialist government, anyway?

A little reciprocity in the multiculturalist idea of respecting other cultures is sorely wanting.

Especially in European and American governments and in their so-called free press.

Freedom of speech includes offensive cartoons and is part and parcel of Western culture.

The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is also part and parcel of so-called Western culture. At least until Darwinists, Marxists, Freudianists and other national socialists and secularists robbed the people of their religious heritage in culture, society and national government.

[ENIGMA]

Thank you for agreeing with me on the point that religious groups in power would outlaw free speech.

Only to the extent that secular socialists outlaw religious speech in government and public schools.

Everybody has free speech. Nobody gets the governmental megaphone.

You want the governmental megaphone. You want the force of government to indoctrinate all the unbelievers that you can and silence the rest.

Tit for tat, you know. We certainly wouldn't allow a secular 'supreme' court to decide any religious matters.

You would, because you do.

Christian votes elect Christian political leaders to power who then appoint judges who share their values.

Even now they are chipping away at the wall of church/state separation which has, by and large, protected all Americans from religious persecution by the government.

It protects you as well. Be glad.

The only "retribution" that the paper should worry about is that of losing paying subscribers.

Since the secular press is the preaching arm of the secular church,

Would this "secular Church" be the EAC or the Illuminati? I have some difficulty remembering which mythical secret order does what items..

they ought to lose their First Amendement and political rights like all the other churches.

Churches have lost no such thing. Christians are still able to vote. Their votes count just as much as anyone else's votes.

Instituting religious laws which protect various religious communities from defamation in public newspapers are summarily banned in so-called secular 'people's democracies.'

As it should be.

Only in a secular dictatorship.

Any place other than a Theocracy, actually.

Why should religious groups get any more protection in that regard than anyone else?

They don't need more protection - just equal protection and civil rights under the law.

You already have that and more.

Creating social unrest? Last I checked it was the rioting religious fanatics that were causing the unrest.

The European social secularists who published the defamatory cartoons caused the social unrest, harm and damages, and should be held liable by the both the people and the government.

The only damage that was caused was by the rioters.

Does this mean that if I torch a few buildings in response to something Pat Robertson said on the 700 Club, I get to send him the bill for the damage?

Who do you blame for riots? The people, or the governments which cause them?

Which government caused this one? Last I checked, the newspaper industry doesn't constitute a government.

We already have social, civil and religious laws against killing the innocent.

Well that's reassuring considering that Christians take it as a matter of faith that none are innocent.

[jcrawford]

Christians are attacked, denigrated and insulted very single day here on this website and on NBC and every other "liberal" outlet. No suicide bombers and mass violence anywhere.

Perhaps Christians should side with their Muslims brothers in their culture war against secular imperialism and national domination since the secular fundamentalists detest and protest all religious fundamentalists equally.

Muslims know that if debate and argument were pitted against their belief system, it wouldn't last. It has been protected by totalitarianism from start to now.

Same can be said for the secular socialists belief system. That's why they are intolerant of religious judges and judgement in their totalitarian political systems.

The lucky part in Islam is oil or else no one would care about this violent part of the world.

The lucky part in secular socialism is that Christians, Jews and Muslims have let corrupt humanistic political philosophies dominate their thinking for so long. Things change in time though. Even the corrupt Social Darwinists will agree on that.