Rioting Continues Over Cartoons

More people are wondering what exactly is behind the rioting, noting that similar affronts to Islam were not met with this kind of violence in the past. This includes a growing number of bloggers from Iraq. That's because we're seeing state-sponsored violence rearing its ugly head once again. It's not a coincidence that that Iran, Syria, and Lebanon were the scenes of the worst of the rioting and torchings of the Danish and Norwegian embassies, along with damage to several others, including the Austrian embassy.

Syria and Iran are trying to precipitate a confrontation with the West and shape Islamic opinion in their favor by taking these actions against Western Democracies.

And the rioting has claimed the lives of two more Afghans.

The French media is taking to publishing the cartoons, while the US press continues to show a lack of spine in general, though there are several notable exceptions.

No Pasaran notes a Eursoc posting exposing that the BBC is taking extra effort to fully state Muhammad's title in Islam: "Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him)." No similar mention is made about Jesus Christ or any other religious figures. A double standard in the media? Who knew. No Pasaran also notes the peculiarity of how and why Muslims who came to Western countries to escape brutal regimes and repressive religious theocracies are now seeking to impose the very ideologies they were trying to escape. Interesting point, but while there are many Muslims who sought to escape the repressive ideologies, the fact is that those who are espousing expanding or restoring the caliphate are Islamists and didn't leave their original countries to escape freedom. They wanted to bring a part of their original country to their new homes.

UPDATE:
Via The Jawa Report, the editors at the New York Press took a walk as the paper decided not to publish the original 12 cartoons.

The editorial staff of the alternative weekly New York Press walked out today, en masse, after the paper's publishers backed down from printing the Danish cartoons that have become the center of a global free-speech fight.

Editor-in-Chief Harry Siegel emails, on behalf of the editorial staff:

New York Press, like so many other publications, has suborned its own professed principles. For all the talk of freedom of speech, only the New York Sun locally and two other papers nationally have mustered the minimal courage needed to print simple and not especially offensive editorial cartoons that have been used as a pretext for great and greatly menacing violence directed against journalists, cartoonists, humanitarian aid workers, diplomats and others who represent the basic values and obligations of Western civilization. Having been ordered at the 11th hour to pull the now-infamous Danish cartoons from an issue dedicated to them, the editorial group—consisting of myself, managing editor Tim Marchman, arts editor Jonathan Leaf and one-man city hall bureau Azi Paybarah, chose instead to resign our positions.

UPDATE:
The Palestinians are rioting once again using the cartoons as a pretext:

Hundreds of Palestinians attacked an international observer mission in this volatile city Wednesday, throwing stones and smashing windows as dozens of foreigners were trapped inside - the most violent West Bank protest yet against Danish cartoons seen as insulting to Islam.

At one point, rioters forced open a door of the building and got inside, and the unarmed observers waved clubs in an attempt to drive them off. Palestinian police, initially outnumbered, eventually pushed back the crowd, and the foreigners began leaving the city.

This must be the Palestinian way of making friends and influencing people.

UPDATE:
Meryl Yourish has a thoughtful piece taking apart the media coverage of the cartoon intifada. She criticizes the lack of fact checking, regurtitating the Islamic point of view without any critical analysis, and conflating the Iranian Holocaust denial cartoon contest with the Danish cartoon publication. In the former instance, the government is specifically promoting and sponsoring the vile cartoon collection and in the latter, it was a wholly private undertaking to create and publish the cartoons. To the AP, it's just another example of moral equivalence muddying the waters.

UPDATE:
Ace has more, including a snippit from Andrew Sullivan who wonders why publishing the cartoons would be considered a 'cheap point' if the publication highlights the culture of fear instilled by the Islamists who have killed unbelievers including Theo Van Gogh and threatened others into hiding.

Amir Taheri ponders the traditional acceptance of satire and criticism in Islam and notes that it's all been subjugated by the new Islamist fundamentalism.

UPDATE:
Egyptian Sandmonkey happened to come across an Egyptian newspaper that published these cartoons during Ramadan and nothing came of it then. The difference between then and now? Someone was behind the rioting - and was instigating with the addition of bogus cartoons.

Technorati: Buy Danish "jyllands-posten mohammed" "muhammad cartoon" embassy torchings "muhammad image archive"