Do you remember “Everybody Draw the Pope Day”? You know — that recent occasion when websites all over the world displayed insulting caricatures of the pontiff? When YouTube and Facebook were blocked by the Vatican? When the faithful in Naples and Madrid took to the streets by the thousands to protest? When mobs of angry Catholics set fire to cars and vandalized Lutheran churches in Bavaria?

No? Don’t remember it? Me neither.

Maybe that’s because every day is “insult the pope day” in most Western countries. Who needs a special day for that?

Nobody has to fear a death fatwa from the College of Cardinals — Get out your pen and paper, boys, and tear into Benedict!

But that’s not exactly the way the Swedish socialists views the situation. They’re worried that there is too little criticism and public discussion about the Catholic Church, especially concerning the latest child abuse scandals. A Swedish Social-Democratic artist evidently felt that it was time to tell the truth about the dangers of Roman Catholicism, and decided to draw a sexually charged cartoon of the pope.

Those daring Swedes! They never hesitate to speak truth to power! Well, hardly ever — when the power in question speaks Arabic and offers large bounties for the heads of blasphemers, even the bravest of Swedish iconoclasts hesitates to whisper to it.

What makes the story below notable is the deep irony of its juxtaposition with last week’s conviction in Skåne of a man who displayed an image of Mohammed with a little girl. The caption of the poster correctly identified the ages of Mohammed and his child bride Aisha (53 and 9, respectively), relying on scripture accepted by Muslims everywhere which states exactly those facts.

For depicting a prominent religious figure as a pedophile, Carl Herslow faces a fine and jail time. The fact that his depiction represents the literal truth as Muslims understand it was no defense, and he was judged guilty of hets mot folkgrupp, incitement against an ethnic group.

Now comes Kjell Nilsson-Mäki, who has also depicted a prominent religious figure as a pedophile. In this case the religious leader is alive, and, as far as I know, has never been accused of molesting any children. Surely this constitutes some form of hets, even if the pope isn’t a folkgrupp. Time for public outrage, and a criminal charge against the artist, right?

Nope! Not in Sweden. In socialist circles, this is simply business as usual.

Here’s the story from The Local (my emphasis):

Catholics Upset by Young Socialists’ Erect Pope Pic

The Catholic Church in Sweden has expressed dismay at the publication by the youth wing of the Social Democrats (SSU) of a caricature of Pope Benedict XVI sporting an erection in the presence of a child.

The cartoon, created by Kjell Nilsson-Mäki and published in SSU’s bimonthly in-house organ Tvärdrag (Crosswind), shows a seated pope entreating a mother to hand over her young child while quoting from the Bible: “Let the children come to me.” A horrified mother and terrified child are clearly distressed by the large bulge beneath the papal robes.

“It’s a sharply acidic satirical image that reflects the systematic abuse of children at the hands of representatives of the Catholic Church. It’s not an attack on the pope and it’s not an attack on the Catholic faith,” Daniel Suhonen, editor of Tvärdrag (Crosswind), told The Local.

“In the cartoon the pope serves as a symbol for the Catholic Church in the same way that a caricaturist might use Mona Sahlin as a symbol for the Social Democrats or Barack Obama as a symbol for the United States,” he added.

But Catholic Church spokeswoman Maria Hasselgren was left unimpressed by the editor’s justifications.

“Unfortunately we’re accustomed to this kind of attack,” she told The Local.

“The editor of the magazine has spoken previously about how he wouldn’t have done the same thing in a Muslim context because Muslims are a vulnerable group in Swedish society. But I think this just displays how skewed his view is of the make-up of the Catholic Church in Sweden. Many Catholics here are immigrants, a lot are unemployed, and quite a few come from war zones such as Iraq. They’re certainly not the sort of powerful elite he implies.”

– – – – – – – – –

Suhonen conceded that the vulnerable position of Muslims in society meant he would think twice about publishing a caricature in a similar vein, though he insisted he would not reject the possibility out of hand.

“Muslims are victims of oppression in Sweden to a much greater extent than Catholics, which makes this caricature less sensitive. But that’s not to say that I wouldn’t have published somebody like Lars Vilks, for example. I don’t know if I would or wouldn’t published because I haven’t been in that situation,” he said.

Hasselgren however said the cartoon was indicative of a level of disdain for the feelings of Catholics that was deep-rooted in Swedish society.

“It goes back to the sort of anti-Catholic sentiment that has existed here since the 16th century. There’s a very commonplace belief among Swedes that Catholicism is all about power and oppression and it’s a belief that remains very close to the surface.”

“But regardless of how insulting this caricature might be we’re not going to take any action. It wouldn’t get us anywhere.”

“Muslims are a vulnerable group in Swedish society… Muslims are victims of oppression in Sweden…”

What is this man smoking? Muslims are the most protected and pampered (and unproductive) group that Sweden has ever known. How can the cultural elites continue to retail whoppers like this one when the truth is so blindingly obvious to everybody?

By the way — as pointed out by KGS, the names of the editor (Suhonen) and the artist (Mäki) are both Finnish in origin. Is this part of some vast Finnish conspiracy? Does it represent a secret plot by Finland to infiltrate Sweden and smash the Catholic Church?

Only time will tell…

Hat tip: C. Cantoni.

Taliban mujahideen in Lahore, Pakistan attacked a mosque belonging to the Ahmadi sect, which is considered heretical by the rest of Islam. The attackers killed at least 17 people, and held about 1,000 worshippers hostage, demanding the release of government-held prisoners.

In other news, a model sharia court has opened in Amsterdam. Meanwhile, a bill to legalize all forms of incest has been proposed in Croatia.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, heroyalwhyness, Insubria, JD, KGS, Reinhard, TB, Vlad Tepes, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

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Independent candidate Tim Cahill has recently been criticizing Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick for his willingness to get cozy with Muslim extremists at Boston’s mega-mosque, not to mention his eagerness to take their money for use in questionable projects.

Here’s a video about the phenomenal success the Muslim Brotherhood has had in co-opting the governor and other state and local officials:

The Iconoclast at the New English Review has more details about the ISBCC and Deval Patrick:
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Americans for Peace and Tolerance (APT), a Boston-based interfaith human rights group, released a video today depicting Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick receiving a check on May 22nd from the radical Islamic Society of Boston Cultural Center (ISBCC ) for $50,000. The proceeds of the ISBCC grant accepted by Governor Patrick would be used to fund “cultural awareness training” for local law enforcement agencies through the Office of State Attorney General (AG) Martha Coakley. AG Coakley was the failed Democratic candidate in the January, 2010 US Senate special election won by Republican Scott Brown. The ISBCC as we have previously posted has close ties to the Muslim Brotherhood front, the Muslim American Society, exemplified by the extreme views of its Imam Abdullah Faaruuq and board of trustees.

Tim Cahill, Massachusetts State Treasurer and Independent candidate in the November gubernatorial contest criticized Governor Patrick for this action. Cahill, in turn, was promptly criticized by Muslim community leaders of the ISBCC at an interfaith gathering, today.

Fjordman’s latest essay has been posted at Democracy Reform. Some excerpts are below:

Far too many are addicted to Socialism and government handouts, both in Greece, the cradle of democracy in the ancient world, and in Britain, the cradle of parliamentary democracy in the modern world. Maybe the best thing Britain can hope for now, if it is going to survive as a nation for native Brits, is an Oliver Cromwell type of person. Democracy of universal suffrage has so far proved itself inadequate at containing the ongoing Third World invasion of the West.

The short-term attention span brought about by brief election cycles hasn’t been good at dealing with long-term threats, economic or otherwise, especially when combined with the dumbing down caused by television and the fact that citizenship and voting rights have been handed out like candy to members of hostile tribes. The USA was specifically designed to be a Constitutional Republic, not a mass democracy.

This arrangement worked well for a long time, yet Americans in 2008 elected an anti-Western Marxist as President. It is a fair bet that their Founding Fathers would have been horrified had they witnessed this. An African Socialist demagogue like Barack Hussein Obama embodies everything they tried to prevent. Perhaps universal suffrage makes a slide to Socialism inevitable, as too many people will vote themselves into possession of other people’s money. They will gradually grow accustomed to this arrangement and will consider it their “right.

It would be tempting to conclude that we should simply hand power over to the self-professed elites. The problem is that the Western ruling oligarchs are committed Globalists and/or brainwashed Marxists who often make even poorer choices than the masses do. For example, in some cases where the masses made sound decisions, such as the Swiss ban on Muslim minarets or the Dutch rejection of the EU Constitution, the elites have tried to overrule this.

– – – – – – – – –

In many cases, the public can be rightfully criticized for making poor choices, but they have also sometimes been betrayed by people they supported who turned out to be very different from what they pretended to be before being elected. Nicolas Sarkozy as French President has disappointed millions of ethnic Frenchmen who voted for him, thinking that he would reverse their country’s slide into poverty and anarchy. As it turns out, he has done virtually nothing to address these issues, but has rather intensified the cultural war waged against the natives.

Mr. Sarkozy apparently cares for nothing other than achieving and maintaining power and the personal privileges associated with this, and will serve any lie necessary in order to do so. If he is the best candidate who can be elected in France then we must conclude that the best isn’t good enough and that France can no longer be saved merely by voting. Tony Blair in Britain was widely popular in the late 1990s during his early years as Prime Minister, yet he arguably did more to hurt his country than any other person in British history. Perhaps mass democracy facilitates the rise of accomplished liars such as Blair, Sarkozy or George W. Bush.

Read the rest at Democracy Reform.

Nilk in Australia sent this news report about the current clinical situation regarding the widespread practice of mutilation of young girls’ genitals among African and Egyptian immigrants in Oz.

The most striking thing about this story is the headline the paper chose:

Push to Let Australian Doctors Mutilate Genitals of Baby Girls

They are obviously quite clear about where they stand on the issue. Would that Australia’s medical personnel so definitive. Instead, we are treated to weasel words:

The practice involving cutting a girl’s genitals, sometimes with razors or pieces of glass, could be allowed in a clinical setting to stem illegal backyard procedures which are leaving young girls scarred for life.

The Royal Australian New Zealand College of Obstetricians will next month discuss backing “ritual nicks”, a modified form of genital mutilation.

How’s that for relativizing medical ethics right out the door? They are actually considering a way to avoid coming down hard on a superstitious barbarism in order to save the little girls? Try killing them with kindness, hmm?

Female genital mutilation has been outlawed in Australia since the 1990s but is common among African, Asian and Middle Eastern communities.

With the rise in Somali and Sudanese numbers in Australia, doctors are seeing more cases of young girls, and women, needing surgery after illegal operations. Backers of “ritual nick” said it was a superficial procedure leaving no long-term damage.

[…]

“We will need to start to think about [its introduction] but we would have to speak to community leaders from Australia,” Dr Pecoraro said.

This doctor needs CME courses in remedial medical ethics, and he needs them yesterday. “We will need to start to think…”?? I’ll say. This guy has a chronic case of cultural diversity indoctrination. If someone doesn’t intervene, he’ll be ready to pick up that scalpel and start “helping” little girls. What do community leaders have to do with his own medical ethics? If it’s wrong for white Australian girls, it’s wrong for black immigrant girls.

“If a nick could meet the cultural needs of a particular woman, then it might save her from going through what can really be drastic surgery.

“But we need to make sure we do not legitimise the ritualistic maiming of children.”

This is incredible. Just talking about the “if” with “community leaders” is legitimising criminal sadism. Surely the man is not really this dim?

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Meanwhile, back in the U.S., the American Academy of Pediatrics has been pushed to the tipping point by outspoken victims and opponents of this scheme and have backed off from last month’s approval:

The American Academy of Pediatrics has rescinded a controversial policy statement raising the idea that doctors in some communities should be able to substitute demands for female genital cutting with a harmless clitoral “pricking” procedure.

“We retracted the policy because it is important that the world health community understands the AAP is totally opposed to all forms of female genital cutting, both here in the U.S. and anywhere else in the world,” said AAP President Judith S. Palfrey.

[…]

In the April statement, the group raised the idea that some physicians should be able to prick or nick a girl’s clitoral skin in order to “satisfy cultural requirements.” The group likened the nick to an ear piercing.

Believe it or not, this issue has been talked about in the American media for at least the last fifteen years. And we’re only now getting officially serious about it.

I can understand the foot-dragging. The logistics of enforcing this ban are a nightmare, and the notion of having to check little girls for signs of damage is daunting.

There is also the problem of parents returning to the old country, or paying the way here for a “visit” by one of their cutters to come in and mutilate as many customers as possible on her visit. So much cheaper for everyone involved. Except for the little girls, of course.

“Cultural practices” are very difficult to change, much less eradicate. You can take the family out of Somalia, but disconnecting them from an indelible belief that women are evil and will ensnare men is all but impossible. Might as well try to convince the Roman Catholic Church that the idea of a celibate clergy has long passed its sell-by date. Even though many, perhaps a majority, of Catholics in the pew no longer believe in this imposed control, those in power sail on as though this rule is inviolable. It isn’t.

So it is with African and Egyptian immigrants, both Muslim and Christian if this report is to be believed…
– – – – – – – – –
Cutting off a little girls’ genitals and sewing closed whatever tissue remains has been against the law in Egypt for some time. Fatwahs have been issued; legislation has been passed, but the practice continues in full force.

From the report, details of a meeting in November 2006:

Prominent Muslim scholars from around the world, including conservative religious leaders from Egypt and Africa, met on Wednesday to speak out against female genital mutilation at a rare high-level conference on the age-old practice. The meeting was organised by a German human rights and held under the patronage of Dar Al-Iftaa, Egypt’s main religious-edicts organisation. It was held at the conference centre of Al-Azhar, the highest Sunni Islamic institution in the world.

Al Azhar’s grand sheik, Mohammed Sayed Tantawi, attended as well as Egypt’s Grand Mufti, Ali Goma’a, whose fatwas are considered binding religious edicts. It is rare for such religious figures in Egypt to attend such a conference on an issue that remains sensitive and controversial here. An estimated 50 percent of schoolgirls in Egypt are thought to undergo the procedure, according to government statistics.

My guess is that it’s higher than just fifty percent. It’s probably also partially a question of class. The further down the socioeconomic scale one goes, the more likely one is to find ‘universally’ accepted cultural norms for the necessity of mutilating girl children.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, writing prior to this new retraction by the American Pediatric Association, said [emphasis is mine — D]:

To understand this problem, we need to begin with parental motives. The “nicking” option is regarded as a necessary cleansing ritual. The clitoris is considered to be an impure part of the girl-child and bleeding it is believed to make her pure and free of evil spirits.

But the majority of girls are subjected to FGM to ensure their virginity-hence the sewing up of the opening of the vagina-and to curb their libido to guarantee sexual fidelity after marriage-hence the effective removal of the clitoris and scraping of the labia. Think of it as a genital burqa, designed to control female sexuality.

When the motive for FGM is to ensure chastity before marriage and to curb female libido, then the nick option is not sufficient.

In other words, these parents know the price their daughter will pay if she is not fixed; she will be considered immoral and unmarriageable.

Ms. Hirsi Ali again:

But even once the legislative flaws are fixed, there remains the really difficult question of detection.

For the law to have any meaningful effect in eradicating FGM in the U.S., we need to work out a way of knowing when a girl has been mutilated. As a legislator in the Netherlands, this was for me the thorniest issue. In the United States, where civil liberties are even more jealously guarded, the thorns are likely to be sharper still.

It is not unrealistic to imagine the ACLU defending some African parents being prosecuted for continuing this barbarity in the U.S.

The proponents of multiculturalism are not only ignorant (i.e., FGM is against the law where these people come from to begin with), they create killing fields where little girls are sacrificed in the name of the multi-cultic orthodoxies.

This one is going to be tough to change. In fact, the only way to change it is to insist on assimilation of immigrants into the larger culture, complete with demands for learning English, an end to polygamy, becoming literate, sending children (especially little girls) to school, and insisting that the able-bodied work to earn their way.

You can’t change deeply held cultural convictions in a generation, but you sure can erode them over time. Especially if you can get the enablers in our own culture to stop assisting in the perpetuation of harmful ideas.

This problem is about changing us. If you have any doubt of it, just look at Dr. Pecoraro’s statements in Australia. He’s definitely an elitist; it shows in his purported “thinking”. That’s the real problem: the hollowed-out slogans that pass for thinking among the elites.

Female genital mutilation in the West is a symptom of a larger problem of criminal cultural idiocy among the natives.

The Royal Australian New Zealand College of Obstetricians is considering approving a modified form of female genital mutilation (FGM) in Australia’s hospitals. Since a growing number of Australian immigrant parents are already performing the mutilation on their baby girls at home, officials hope to mitigate the worst effects by having a modified version of the procedure performed by licensed surgeons under hospital conditions. Opponents of this idea say that it will help legitimize a barbaric custom.

In other news, a bomb blast derailed a train in West Bengal, India, throwing it into the path of an oncoming freight train and killing at least fifteen people. Maoist guerillas are considered the most likely culprits behind the attack.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, CSP, El Inglés, Fjordman, Gaia, Insubria, JD, Nilk, Reinhard, TB, Vlad Tepes, Zenster, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

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People are starving in Gaza, aren’t they?

Well, apparently not. Not all of them, anyway. Our Flemish correspondent VH has translated this tasty little morsel from the Belgian website Joods Actueel:

Luxury in Gaza: The images “Broederlijk Delen” & co. wants to hide from the outside world

Cactus Roots Club in Gaza

We hear from organizations such as Broederlijk Delen [“Brotherly Sharing”; “a Flemish faith-based non-profit aid organization that supports local groups in the global South”] and Intal [ditto; “Globalize Solidarity!”] quite often about the “appalling humanitarian situation” in the Palestinian territories. We have often poked holes in this misrepresented image and continue to do so. This time with images of a luxurious restaurant and catering service in Gaza. Visit the website and literally fall from your chair!

Want to have a look in the extensive menu? That is possible here. Please note — for those having trouble deciding — the menu includes no fewer than sixteen pages, with dozens of main courses and appetizers. You have thus been warned! We have already opted for the Chateaubriand in Béarnaise sauce or the Pavés de Rumsteak au Poivre vert, although the Sole Meunière and the Cordon bleu chicken (p.12) also do not seem too bad…

We daresay that Brigitte Herremans (the Palestine envoy for Broederlijk Delen — ed.) will have frequently eaten her sandwiches here. And in case you might be around, here’s the address: Cairo Street, Rimal, Gaza. A table can be booked in advance by emailing, or calling +970 8 288 8666.

[More photos at the article]

And don’t forget this video of the posh establishment:

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Bon appétit!

“The second generation of non-Western immigrants makes greater use of collective provisions and contributes less in taxes and social security premiums than the average citizen.”

Last year Geert Wilders asked the Dutch government to prepare a cost-benefit analysis of immigration into the Netherlands, so that voters could make an informed decision about whether mass immigration from the Third World should be halted. The government refused his request, so his party commissioned a report from NYFER, a private research firm, to assess the overall net cost of immigration.

As Mr. Wilders mentioned in his speech last week, the results are in, and the report has been published. The full NYFER report (in Dutch, pdf) is available online, and the conclusions (in Dutch, pdf) have also been posted.

Our Flemish correspondent VH has kindly translated NYFER’s conclusions for Gates of Vienna. It’s easy to see why the Dutch government was reluctant to look into the matter: for the last ten years, the net cost of immigration to the Netherlands has been €7.2 billion annually.

Below is the PVV’s introduction to the report, followed by the entire text of the conclusions as reported by NYFER and published by the Party for Freedom:

10 years’ immigration in the Netherlands costs 72 billion euros

The Dutch government [the Balkenende Cabinet] refused last year to investigate the cost of mass immigration at the request of the PVV fraction. The research institute NYFER has now conducted this study, as commissioned by the PVV. The results are shocking. The Party for Freedom is pleased that the taxpayers will finally get what they are entitled to: insight into what happens with their money.

On a net migration of 25,000 non-Western immigrants per year, with an equal number of offspring, our society loses €7.2 billion [$8.8 billion] a year. Ten years of unchanged immigration policy therefore means running up a tab that eventually costs the society 72 billion euros [$8.8 billion]. Compared to natives, non-Western immigrants pay less on net taxes and premiums, are more dependent on government benefits (including social security benefits) and are more often involved in crime with all its associated costs.

PVV faction leader Geert Wilders: “The fact that mass immigration is also disastrous from a financial standpoint confirms the need for the actions the Party for Freedom recommends, such as a halt to immigration from Muslim countries, a reduction of the remaining migration and asylum flows, and the exclusion of new immigrants from social security benefits for a period of ten years.”

Most important conclusions of the NYFER report:

– – – – – – – – –

• Non-Western immigrants make greater use of public goods and contribute less on taxes and social security than the average resident of the Netherlands. The result therefore is a negative net contribution to public finances. When income and expenses over the course of a lifetime are calculated, each non-Western immigrant between 25 and 35 years of age costs the public sector between €40,000 and € 50,000 [$49,000 to $61,000]. At other ages, the cost are higher. This is the approximate cost of an ‘average’ non-Western immigrant with socio-economic characteristics that match those of the current population of non-Western immigrants.
• These costs are incurred because non-Western immigrants more likely than average to rely on disability benefits, unemployment, and social security benefits. They also make a greater use of [health] care, and in addition their overrepresentation in crime is causing extra costs. Equally important are greater expenditures on housing benefits. In contrast, they make less use of child care and of higher vocational and university education. Immigrants also often have an incomplete state pension [which builds up with 2% per year from the age of 15 until 65; immigrants who arrive when older than that will not be able to build up the full 100% — translator].
• The costs are highly dependent on (1) the age of entry, (2) socio-economic characteristics that determine the chances of employment, (3) the progress of integration, particularly as it effects participation in employment, and (4) the duration of stay, respective to the extent to which return migration takes place to the country of origin.
• For a complete assessment of the budgetary impact of immigration one should not only consider the net contribution of first-generation non-Western immigrants (the immigrants themselves), but also those of the second generation (the offspring of the first generation). The second generation of non-Western immigrants makes greater use of collective provisions and contributes less in taxes and social security premiums than the average citizen. Measured by their participation in the labor market (net participation rate), the second generation on average makes up 38% of the backlog generated by their parents in comparison with the average resident of the Netherlands.
• With an annual immigration of a net 25,000 non-Western immigrants and an annual increase of 25,000 descendants, the costs for the public sector are € 7.2 billion [circa $8.8 billion] per year (in 2008 euros). In this connection, it is again assumed that the use of public services and the contributions to taxes and premiums match those of the current population of non-Western immigrants, and that the second generation makes up 38% of the socio-economic backlog.
• When more immigrants to return to their country of origin (58% instead of the present 46%), for example because a higher proportion of immigrants consists of students or others who stay temporarily in the Netherlands, the public costs are reduced by € 0.5 billion [$0.6 billion]. When the chance of return migration is halved (to 23%), for example because there is more often a matter of family formation or family reunification, the cost for the public sector increases by €0.9 billion [$1 billion].
• An improved integration of second-generation non-Western immigrants reduces the costs for the public sector. When the second generation makes up the socio-economic backlog by 50% instead of the present 38%, that saves the Treasury structurally €0.6 billion [$0.97 billion] per year.
• The Netherlands has too long upheld the idea that immigrants would stay only temporarily in the Netherlands, and the impact of continued migration has been underestimated. There also is no selective admission policy, such as in many other countries. Additionally, the relatively extensive social services have contributed to unskilled or low skilled migrants coming to the Netherlands. Partly also because of this, the Netherlands — together with several other European countries — belongs to the group of countries where the employment participation of immigrants lags behind at a relatively high rate compared to that of the indigenous population. Consequently, the costs to the public sector are higher than in many other countries.

VH adds:

The full report has some interesting additional material. For example, it mentions that immigrants who intermarry with natives have a much better ratio of contribution to the socio-economic sphere as well as to society in general than those who don’t (such as non-Western immigrants from Muslim countries). This is an interesting matter, considering that Muslims predominantly intermarry within their own religious group (local or imported), and at best exclude non-Muslims from their social contacts — even worse is when they are hostile towards the natives.

The complete report on the budgetary impact of immigration of non-Western immigrants can be found on the NYFER website (NYFER performs applied research at the intersection of economics and policy). The report (pdf) can be downloaded here, and also at the PVV website.

Three major Counterjihad figures are paying a visit to Canada next month:

• Bat Ye’or, the acclaimed author of Eurabia
• Sam Solomon, author of Al-Yahud: Eternal Islamic Enmity & the Jews
• David Littman, whose tireless struggle against the Islamic dominance of the UN human rights establishment was featured here a few days ago

Their tour is being co-sponsored by the Free Thinking Film Society and the Canadian chapter of the International Free Press Society. Below is a promotional video prepared by Vlad for the occasion:

The three speakers will appear in London, Ontario on June 2, in Toronto on June 3, and in Ottawa on June 7. Bat Ye’or and Sam Solomon will be guests on the popular Michael Coren radio show on Thursday, June 3rd at 6:00 PM.

For more details about the events, plus information on prices and tickets, see IFPS-Canada.

Hat tip: Vlad Tepes.

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Polish investigators have finally admitted that General Andrzej Blasik, the commander of the Polish air force, was in the cockpit of the military plane when it crashed near Smolensk on April 10, killing 96 Polish military and political leaders.

In other news, Spanish Prime Minister José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero has unveiled his plan to pull his country out of its fiscal crisis: he wants to tax the rich. Meanwhile, Islamic experts in Indonesia have issued a fatwa forbidding the employment of transsexuals in women’s hair salons.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, Fjordman, heroyalwhyness, Insubria, JD, JP, RRW, TB, Zenster, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

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I reported earlier today about the controversial Zapiro cartoon of “Mohammed on the Couch” that was published on Everybody Draw Mohammed Day in the Mail & Guardian, a South African newspaper. Now it seems that the M&G has caved in the face of relentless mau-mauing by the organized Muslim grievance-mongers.

[Before everybody jumps all over me again: Yes, I know that the paper is a progressive one, and that all the people involved are leftists. I knew that from the first article I read, but evidently I didn’t explain myself clearly enough in my previous post.]

The leftist nature of the M&G helps explain why the paper caved in relatively easily — after all, defending freedom of “racist” speech doesn’t come easily to a cultural Marxist.

But the amazing thing is that they evidently hadn’t the faintest idea of what they were setting themselves up for. Did they really think that because they were fervent progressives, they would be spared the wrath of the Universal Muslim Rage Boy? Have they been holed up in a cave these last nine years?

If they have any sense at all, they now understand the rules of the game: Islam trumps Marxism every time, without exception. Any leftist who thinks he can cha-cha with the prophet without assuming the Full Submission Position is sadly mistaken.

When you read the reports below, notice that the author and the paper’s editor sound very, very grateful that South African Muslims showed commendable restraint and did not resort to violence. Note also that South Africa’s population is about 15% Muslim, which tells us that the minimum local density of Islam before it gains full cultural control must be less than 15%. (Correction: I dropped a decimal place when looking at the database figures — only 1.5% of South Africa’s population is Muslim. This makes this surrender even more alarming, because it shows that a mere 1.5% of the population can intimidate the other 98.5%.)

Here’s the first of two articles from M&G:

M&G Meets With Muslim Leaders

A meeting between Muslim leaders and the Mail & Guardian after the publication of a controversial cartoon has left M&G CEO Hoosain Karjieker proud of the community and the process followed to reach a resolution.

The newspaper has undertaken to refrain from publishing any images of the Prophet Muhammad while reviewing their editorial policy in terms of religious matters, after a meeting with Muslim leaders from a cross-section of organisations, and interest groups.

The meeting at Channel Islam in Johannesburg on Wednesday followed a failed court attempt by the Muslim Council of Theologians to stop the newspaper from publishing a Zapiro cartoon on May 21.

The cartoon depicted the Prophet Muhammad reclining on a psychiatrist’s chair bemoaning his followers’ lack of humour. It referenced the uproar in some Muslim communities over the Everyone Draw Muhammad Day campaign.

While interest in the incident has been high, with traffic volumes doubling on the M&G site, there was no violent backlash. Karjieker was particularly impressed with the Muslim Judicial Council (MJC), which called on the community not to boycott the newspaper.

“It’s been very good,” said editor Nic Dawes. “I think a discussion that has been simmering quietly has been brought out into the open. Ultimately we’ve reached a very South African solution.

“I’m delighted actually.”

Cross-section

Represented at the meeting were leaders from the MJC, the Muslim Council of Theologians — or Jamiatul Ulama — and the Somali Association of SA, among others.

– – – – – – – – –

“It was a tough meeting but the level of engagement was very mature,” said Karjieker. “It was on a level we haven’t had before as a community or a paper.”

Cartoonist Jonathan Shapiro, or Zapiro, flew from Cape Town to attend the meeting. He refrained from commenting, saying that his follow-up cartoon in the M&G‘s next edition on Friday May 28 would explain his thoughts. Dawes said the cartoonist, who has won awards for his cutting depictions, said his cartoons have angered many — including his own community.

“I think Zapiro made a clear statement of his principles as a cartoonist and satirist,” said Dawes, pointing out that Zapiro’s secular values meant equal treatment of everyone.

But both Zapiro and Dawes were adamant about distancing themselves and condemning the Islamophobia that has characterised some of the Facebook campaign.

Karjieker pointed out that the discussion, while tough, would open the space for further issues that people can talk about “using the paper as a forum”.

A statement was issued however, saying the M&G regretted “the harm caused by the publication of the cartoon and apologises for the effects thereof”.

Friendly terms

Dawes said the meeting ended on “genuinely very friendly terms”.

He said the new policy would be “informed in consultation with religious leaders from all major faith communities,” and ultimately by the constitutional values of freedom of expression and our own values as a newspaper, of social justice.

Present at the meeting were about 21 people, including MJC representative Ahmed Igsaan Sedick, who had previously denounced death threats against Zapiro.

While rejecting the cartoon, the MJC called death threats against the cartoonist “un-Islamic”, saying such threats had no place in the religion or society, the Cape Argus reported.

“It only implies that Muslims lack the intellect to resolve disagreements through proper dialogue and communication, which is far from the truth.”

The statement was in keeping with Dawes’ own view that “no cartoon is as insulting as the assumption Muslims will react with violence”.

Invitation

The newspaper invited community leaders and ordinary readers to continue communicating their devotion both online and to the newspaper.

“We have learnt an enormous amount since the publication of the cartoon about the depth of reverence in which Muslims hold the Prophet.”

Muslim leaders were compiling a combined statement at the time of publication and were unable to comment immediately.

The second article is the formal paper’s formal abasement and acknowledgement of dhimmitude:

Mail & Guardian Regrets Muhammad Cartoon

The Mail & Guardian (M&G) newspaper regrets the offence caused by a cartoon depicting the prophet Muhammad published on Friday, editor Nic Dawes said.

Dawes said the newspaper, along with cartoonist Jonathan Shapiro, better known as Zapiro, met with Muslim community representatives and business leaders in Johannesburg on Wednesday to discuss their concerns.

“We explained to them that we did not intend to cause any harm and we distanced ourselves from the islamophobic imagery depicted on a Facebook group,” Dawes told Sapa in a telephonic interview.

The cartoon, published on Friday, depicts Muhammad lying on a couch complaining to a psychiatrist: “Other prophets have followers with a sense of humour!”

Dawes said publishing the cartoon did not mean the newspaper supported the Facebook group “Everybody Draw Muhammad Day” that sparked outrage in Pakistan and other Muslim countries.

In distancing itself from the group, the M&G explained on its website the group claimed to be a protest against restrictions on freedom of speech and religious fanaticism, but had seemingly become a forum for venting islamophobic sentiment.

“We certainly didn’t intend the cartoon to be an endorsement of those kinds of sentiments, which we repudiate,” Dawes wrote on the site.

“We regret the offence caused by the cartoon and the pain experienced by many Muslims around the country.”

On Wednesday Dawes said in light of what the paper had learned since publishing the cartoon on Friday, it decided to review its editorial policy on religion, especially where it concerned the Prophet Muhammad.

The review would be informed by consultation with a variety of parties within the country and based on “the constitutional values of freedom of expression and the M&G‘s own values of social justice”.

“We have committed to not reproduce depictions of the Prophet during the review period.”

Dawes could not give a time frame on how long the review process would take, but said it may be a couple of months. The review did not mean the M&G was going to relinquish its editorial independence.

“I cannot commit myself to any religious rules in editorial considerations,” he said, but consideration would be given to respect all communities.

“We parted very amicably with the community and I am very pleased that we can come out of it with one of those very special South African solutions where dialogue managed to resolve a very difficult situation,” Dawes said about the meeting.

If you can stomach any more, see the full statement from Nic Dawes (pdf).

Hat tip: TB.

The most prominent MSM contributor to Everybody Draw Mohammed Day was a South African cartoonist named Jonathan Shapiro, a.k.a. Zapiro, who drew this political cartoon for the Mail & Guardian:

To see a full-sized version, click here.


The appearance of the cartoon caused a huge controversy in South Africa. The Council of Muslim Theologians got wind of its existence prior to press time, and attempted without success to block its publication. Muslim groups expressed their customary indignation and anger. The CMT issued the obligatory veiled threat that is routinely employed by CAIR and other Muslim groups throughout the West:

[The Council of Muslim Theologians] added that while it wouldn’t advocate violence, it couldn’t necessarily guarantee that there wouldn’t be any.

Muslim spokesmen invariably disclaim any personal intention of reacting violently, but they also assume that their co-religionists are so primitive and childlike that they can’t control their own behavior in the face of cartoons and jokes. Are these spokesmen unaware of how badly this reflects on the people to whom they give voice? Or do they simply not care?

Mail & Guardian editor Nic Dawes gave the most cogent summary of the Zapiro Cartoon Affair:

“In my view no cartoon is as insulting to Islam as the assumption that Muslims are incapable of reacting to a challenging image with anything but violence.”

This is the same theme I broached last night in my EDMD post-mortem. It is patronizing and — dare I say it? — racist to assume that Muslims have any less autonomy, agency, and capacity for self-control than the rest of us do. The onus is upon them to learn how to behave in a civilized manner in a civilized country, not upon us to restrain our satirical impulses in order to avoid giving offense.

From what I can gather, the Mail & Guardian is not what I would call a conservative paper, and through his cartoons Zapiro seems to be a crusader for social justice and other progressive causes. The paper and the cartoonist did not embroil themselves in this controversy out of any Counterjihad sentiments. Quite the contrary.

Our British correspondent JP has collected a series of articles and op-eds about the Zapiro cartoon from various South African media sources. I’ll put the full text of each article in tonight’s news feed, but some relevant excerpts are below.

First, a letter from the editor of the Mail & Guardian:

The cartoon depicts the Prophet Muhammad reclining on a therapist’s couch and saying sadly “Other prophets’ followers have a sense of humour”.

When I first saw the image, and approved it for publication, it was clear to me that it was Zapiro’s contribution to the global debate around representations of the Prophet. This is an enormously complex and sensitive subject, but I felt that Zapiro had attempted to handle it with care. Unlike some other cartoonists who have tackled the same subject, he had not used Islamophobic imagery, nor had he mocked the prophet.

What the cartoon does do, is use humour to ask why the concerns of one religious group should be privileged above those of others, and above the freedom of expression rights enshrined in our constitution.

Zapiro’s talent for satirical analysis means that he causes offence from time-to-time — sometimes very profound offence. His very strong criticism of the Israeli occupation of Palestine, and of human rights abuses by the Israeli government, for example, angers many Jewish South Africans.

His depictions of the Pope in cartoons dealing with the policies and doctrines of the Vatican offend some of our Catholic readers, and his depictions of President Jacob Zuma have drawn not only anger from the President, but a multimillion-rand lawsuit.

It was against this backdrop that I made the decision to publish the cartoon. I understand that for many Muslims any representation of the Prophet, no matter how innocuous, is offensive and I genuinely regret any offence that the cartoon may have caused those who hold this belief dear. That regret does not, however, outweigh my duty to the principle of freedom expression. Zapiro expresses himself by drawing, and to deny him his pen would be to deny him his voice.

[…]

Some have suggested that it was irresponsible of us to publish the cartoon, knowing that it would anger a section of the community, and might lead to violence. Counsel for Jamiatul Ulama argued this point strongly in a court bid to prevent distribution of today’s newspaper.

I take a different view. I believe that it is more insulting to Islam to assume that Muslims will react violently to a challenging image, than it is to publish such an image. I have complete faith that local Muslim community holds dear the same constitutional values as the M&G. I will be holding discussions with Muslim leaders in the coming days in order to listen to their concerns.

South Africa is home to a multitude of faith communities, as well as to strongly divergent secular viewpoints. We possess an extraordinary talent for having difficult conversations, and emerging stronger from them. I welcome that conversation; on our website, in the newspaper, and in direct interaction with our readers.

From the comments section:
– – – – – – – – –

Dear Editor

We the South African Muslim community is deeply offended by your cartoon mocking the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) and depicting him negatively. It is evident that this publication is aimed to demonise the character and personality of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) who is followed by 1.5 billion Muslims globally and who is admired by millions of others all over the world. After all, what was the intention of this publication by depicting the Prophet negatively when it is a well known fact that he was a paragon of peace, mercy, tolerance and forgiveness?

The publication of this cartoon demonstrates contempt for the religious beliefs of the Muslim Community. This cartoon has abused freedom of speech by taking it to a dangerous, irresponsible and unacceptable level by showing disregard for the sensitivities of Muslims of South Africa. The Muslim community views the publication of such offensive material as a serious attack on the integrity of their religion, and as an attack on the global Muslim Community.

The media has a duty to act responsibly in sensitive issues of this nature and not to push the right to freedom of expression to ridiculous levels where the lines of distinction between profound and profane are virtually obliterated. Freedom of expression is not an absolute; it is limited by the requirement of not causing offence or inciting racial or religious hatred.

[…]

The entire culture and value system of Islam is based on respect and reverence, such as respect for parents, wives, elders, religious symbols and so forth but for some respect means nothing at all. Such people satirise and mock anything and everything, including their own religion, all of which is done in the name of freedom of expression. They expect to also mock at others, in the name of freedom of expression. But Muslims, who are required by their religion to respect all of the Holy Prophets (peace be upon all of them), will not tolerate the mockery of any of the Holy Prophets. Hence when the Prophet (peace be upon him) was mocked in the cartoon, there is a furious reaction from Muslims.

Two things are wrong with the cartoon. Firstly, the illustrated depiction of the Holy Prophet (PBUH), and worse, the intention to ridicule the Prophet (peace be upon him) through it. This is an explosion waiting to happen. We view this as an example of the ignorance and arrogance that you have displayed.

Ismaeel Adam

A summary of what happened, published in the next day’s edition of the Mail & Guardian:

Uproar Over M&G Prophet Muhammad Cartoon

It was a late night in court for the Mail & Guardian as the Council of Muslim Theologians on Thursday evening tried to stop the newspaper from publishing a Zapiro cartoon featuring the Prophet Muhammad.

An interdict was not granted, but on Friday morning M&G editor-in-chief Nic Dawes and other staff were fielding a flood of angry callers, and even death threats hit the newspaper’s office.

“You’ve got to watch your back” and “This will cost him his life” were some of the remarks made.

The cartoon followed the furore surrounding the Facebook page, “Everybody Draw Muhammad Day”, which was sparked by threats by a radical Muslim group against the creators of US TV series South Park for depicting the prophet in a bear suit.

Zapiro’s cartoon, published in Friday’s M&G, depicted the prophet reclining on a psychiatrist’s couch and bemoaning his followers’ lack of humour.

When Dawes first saw the cartoon he said he thought it “a gentle and irreverent poke” at the hysteria that had greeted the Facebook page. This week Pakistan ordered all internet service providers to block Facebook, as well as YouTube for carrying “un-Islamic content”.

Dawes recounted how he received a call from an attorney from the council at about 8.30pm on Thursday night — after the distribution process of the Friday paper had begun. “He asked for an undertaking that we would stop distribution of the paper and remove the cartoon.”

Dawes pointed out that this was impossible, and that in any event the M&G would not do so.

By 11.30pm the newspaper’s advocate had been pulled out of a dinner party and Dawes, along with the paper’s investigation unit, found himself in the South Gauteng High Court ready to defend the M&G’s right to freedom of speech.

However, the council, or Jamiatul Ulama as it is also known, failed to provide the necessary papers for the M&G to answer. It presented verbal evidence, but the judge ruled the interdict failed in terms of urgency, as the newspaper was already available in some outlets and the cartoon had already been published on the M&G Online.

It was a case of trying to close the stable doors long after the horse had bolted, the newspaper’s counsel pointed out.

Furthermore, the judge found that the newspaper’s rights had been compromised by not being provided with founding papers advising what the case against it was.

While the council pleaded with the judge not to throw the case out on technical grounds, she answered that “as a judge and as a Muslim I am bound by our Constitution and the rules of our courts”.

Earlier, the judge made a decision to not recuse herself, saying her own religious background wouldn’t influence her.

Violent backlash

The Council of Muslim Theologians is the same organisation that succeeded in preventing the Sunday Times in 2006 from republishing the controversial Danish cartoons of the prophet.

During Thursday’s application the council repeatedly raised the spectre of a violent backlash, saying that the timing of the cartoon was bad because of a possible threat to the Soccer World Cup.

It added that while it wouldn’t advocate violence, it couldn’t necessarily guarantee that there wouldn’t be any.

“We very much saw that as a threat, and our counsel vigorously objected,” said Dawes. The judge upheld the objection.

While the council was unhappy with the court’s decision, it agreed to meet Dawes to take the discussion forward.

“The M&G is a platform for debate,” Dawes emphasised, adding that everyone was welcome to engage in debate and discussion with the paper. “My view is no cartoon is as insulting to Islam as the assumption Muslims will react with violence.”

However, he also noted that had the cartoon been in any way Islamophobic, or crossed the line in terms of hate speech and racism, he would not have published it.

But Zapiro’s cartoons, he said, offend many people. Many noted that the award-winning South African political cartoonist, whose pen has repeatedly and poignantly exposed corrupt politicians and various hypocrisies in the public sphere, could have been far harsher if he wished.

As Dawes said: “If we had to pull every Zapiro cartoon that offended someone we wouldn’t have any Zapiro cartoons in the newspaper.”

From the Mail & Guardian:

Zapiro’s Cartoon: A lesson in democracy

Here’s a quick recent history in case you missed it.

• April 2010: Creators of the irreverent cartoon series, South Park, receive death threats for depicting the Prophet Muhammad in an episode and elements of it are self-censored by the network.
• April 26: A global desktop activist drive launches on Facebook: “Everybody Draw Muhammad Day” is set for May 20. Cue giant uproar in Muslim communities around the world, including Pakistan restricting access to Facebook, Flickr, YouTube and Wikipedia.
• May 20: South Africa: Ridiculously astute and talented South African cartoonist Jonathan Shapiro delivers a gentle poke at Islamic over-reaction in Friday’s edition of the Mail & Guardian, depicting the prophet reclining in a psychiatrist’s chair bemoaning his followers’ lack of humour.
• 11.30pm, May 20: Court room drama till the wee hours as the Council of Muslim Theologians attempts — and fails — to halt the newspaper’s distribution.

It was mayhem. M&G editor Nic Dawes was up till 2am with our legal team. The next day we were hit with a storm of angry letters and calls. Traffic volumes on this website went through the roof as the story went global. Lawyers were dragged out of dinner parties, people shouted at us, phones rang off the hook and Muslim leaders slammed our lack of sensitivity.

In other words, democracy happened. I staggered home after a long day of answering angry emails and moderating reams of comments on related articles. But I looked back proud of my country, our people and our Muslim community.

[…]

And it’s not just the war-torn developing world. In the West, Islam is the new Russia. Europeans and Americans seem not to know what to do with their Muslim communities — unless they conform thoroughly to the country’s cultural milieu they’re generally left out of its mainstream life. We’ve never had that problem in South Africa.

When I lived in The Netherlands for a few months in 2005, I was surprised — and disturbed — by the ghettoisation of Muslims. They seemed marginalised and maligned. Coming from a country where Muslims have been part and parcel of our national identity for centuries, it was a strange sight.

[…]

Perhaps it’s because our Islamic community is so firmly and unashamedly part of who we are as a nation that we haven’t had the same tensions that plague other secular countries with a significant Muslim population.

From the Cape Argus:

No apology from Mail & Guardian

The Mail & Guardian newspaper says it will not apologise for a Zapiro cartoon it published on Friday depicting Prophet Muhammad.

The newspaper was due to meet with the Muslim Judicial Council (MJC) tomorrow to discuss the cartoon which has been greeted with outrage in the Muslim community. The cartoon shows Prophet Muhammad lying on a psychiatrist’s couch complaining: “Other prophets have followers with a sense of humour!”

MJC president Moulana Ighsaan Hendricks said they would discuss the matter further once the meeting had taken place.

Mail & Guardian editor Nic Dawes said they would be going to listen to what the MJC had to say, but said they would not be offering an apology. “But we will express our regret for the distress we may have caused our readers,” he said. He confirmed that Zapiro would be present at the meeting tomorrow.

Muslims consider any depiction of Prophet Muhammad as offensive. Dawes said: “My view is no cartoon is as insulting as the assumption Muslims will react with violence.” In an online statement he said: “When I first saw the image, and approved it for publication, it was clear to me that it was Zapiro’s contribution to the global debate around representations of the Prophet. This is an enormously complex and sensitive subject, but I felt that Zapiro had attempted to handle it with care.”

Several Muslim organisations met yesterday to discuss the cartoon of the Prophet and said it was “blasphemous, insulting, insensitive and hurtful to the Muslim community. Organisations formed a committee, the United Muslim Forum of South Africa, who said they had a mandate to obtain an apology and appropriate assurances from the Mail & Guardian newspaper.

Hendricks said the organisation respected Zapiro’s right to freedom of expression, but that the cartoonist had to apply this with sensitivity to religious beliefs.

Zapiro was not willing to comment when contacted last night to discuss the matter.

From The Guardian (UK):

South African paper refuses to apologise for cartoon of Prophet Mohammed

A row that blew up last week in South Africa over another newspaper cartoon featuring the Prophet Muhammad shows no signs of dying down.

Nic Dawes, the editor of the Mail & Guardian, has made it clear ahead of his meeting today with the Council of Muslim Theologians that he will not apologise for running the cartoon last Friday. Drawn by Zapiro (the pen name of Jonathan Shapiro), it depicted the prophet reclining on a therapist’s couch and saying: “Other prophets have followers with a sense of humour!…”

The Muslim group, alerted on Thursday evening to the contents of the cartoon, tried to prevent its publication by launching a late-night high court action. Copies of the paper were already being distributed when the judge ruled in the paper’s favour.

Staff at the Mail & Guardian, a weekly tabloid regarded as a serious newspaper, have since received threats.

From Thought Leader (a production of M&G):

So what’s the big deal with drawing the prophet?

I can’t understand why the media, the West and everyone else who engaged in the “Let’s Draw Muhammad” contest recently couldn’t, in all their secular intelligence, attempt to first UNDERSTAND and then act instead of the other way round. I am also extremely disappointed with Zapiro for simply “jumping on the bandwagon” which is very unlike him. The Zapiro I’m used to has deep insight, sharp wit and gets to the heart of the issue at hand. Zapiro’s cartoon depicting the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) shows only deep ignorance … but I’ll analyse that later.

First, let’s get to the heart of the matter. Why are Muslims going crazy when this happens? Well, at the essence, we do not draw the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) or represent him in any way or form even though we do have detailed, verified and ratified descriptions of him because it is mentioned in the Qur’an not to fall into the trap of worshipping the Prophet instead of God. Secondly, Muslims believe in ALL of the prophets of God — Moses, Jesus, Noah, Jonah, Adam etc (peace be upon them all) and we don’t DRAW any of them.

[…]

Finally, I pray … that intelligence dawns on both sides of this conflict. It’s a shame on humanity that BOTH sides are acting like this. Let’s grow up.

Muhammad Karim is a blogger on Tech Leader and a contributing author on Global Voices Online.

From the Cape Argus:

Why I’m crossing swords with Zapiro

One of my prized possessions is a 1987 United Democratic Front calendar by Jonathan Shapiro, or Zapiro, which has accompanied me in almost every office I’ve occupied. It has served as a summary of most that I have valued in my participation in the Struggle, and a reminder of the power of the arts to communicate when intolerance shuts down other, more linear voices.

In the battle for ideas and a better life, there is a genre that pushes back boundaries, can be iconoclastic and subversive, surface truth and expose falsehood, and yet leave the powerful that are challenged perplexed, because no tangible law was broken. They feel subverted, but bear no external wounds.

This sense overwhelmed me on seeing Zapiro participate in the “Draw Muhammad Day”. I was perplexed. I can well imagine how delicious the prospect must be to take on one of the remaining boundaries in an increasingly post-modern world.

The prospect of “drawing Muhammad” is alluring to those who pride themselves on iconoclasm and subversion.

Put at the service of a higher purpose like extending the boundaries of free expression, the campaign to “draw Muhammad” has just the right mix of nobility that comes from extending the truth, and danger that comes from taking on a group of people who appear to have long ago traded reason for the more instant elevation to paradise.

So why would I, in my state of ambiguity, even dare to cross swords (or pens) with Jonathan Shapiro about a cartoon?

Maybe because I suspect that he identifies himself with higher purposes and that he is in a space of values that sets him apart from his contemporaries who initiated the campaign to “draw Muhammad”. Maybe it’s just useful to seize the opportunity to debate and tease out the complexities of an issue so as not to cede the ground to those who label, threaten and harm in a battle of higher purposes.

[…]

What does all of this have to do with Zapiro’s cartoon? I raise this, I think, to invite Zapiro to understand the whole and to work at even higher purposes, and to fight real enemies. We need to distinguish the powerful from the victims. When we “draw Muhammad”, are we not helping powerful extremists by indignifying and mobilising already emasculated victims? For those who write, draw, speak and act with conscience, is our higher purpose today not to defuse the fundamentalist instincts — whether they sit in the Pentagon, wear explosives in Palestine, march into Gaza, peddle fast-food salvation or instant paradise, or make the poor invisible in the economic forums of the world?

We need to understand that we, too, are capable of advancing a fundamentalist agenda when we fail to advance rights, freedoms and values in relation to each other, and instead choose one or a few that we are closest to. We adopt unwittingly the mantle of those we challenge when such distinctions evade us.

[…]

To this day, Muslim antipathy toward depiction persists because it detracts from purity of faith. The Islamic heartlands have been denuded of relics and artefacts in a sometimes overzealous interpretation of this. To not know this, and to want to wage war against the intolerant fundamentalist strain in the Muslim community by using as the weapon of choice the very thing — depiction — that Islam emerged against, is to perpetuate the very conditions in the Muslim world that have bred violence. Muslims are brought up not to visualise or imagine the Prophet, but to mould their lives on the practice of the Prophet.

Zapiro, therefore, assists in convincing the majority of Muslims, who are ordinary, peaceful, tolerant, joking and humorous, that maybe there is something in that siren song which attempts to seduce them with the idea that there is only hostility with a world that disrespects their precepts of faith.

[…]

We need to nurture a gentler, more caring and free world with an enormous capacity for humour, that comes from those who are secure in their sense of dignity.

We must resist the siren songs of fundamentalists of all kinds. By pushing the boundary of Muslim aversion to depiction, we disturb the equilibrium that holds us all in check.

As for Zapiro, I refuse to burn my 1987 UDF calendar.

Ebrahim Rasool is an MP and founder of World for All Foundation

Our Swedish correspondent Freedom fighter sends a couple of reports about a culturally enriched shooting in Malmö.

When I first started covering Malmö four or five years ago, immigrant violence was largely confined to stone-throwing and arson. Since then it has escalated to knifings and shootings, and there have even been incidents when shots were directed at the police.

Freedom Fighter says:

There has been more violence in Sweden’s multicultural capital Malmöstan, as members of an immigrant gang shoot two people who were to witness against the gang’s leader in court.

The first article is from The Local, and is in English:

Trial Witness Shot in Malmö

A man who was due to testify against a member of the Black Cobra criminal gang has been shot at a bus stop in Malmö. A female bystander was also injured in the shooting. Both victims were shot in the leg.

The victims were both shot at a bus stop on Erikfältsgatan, in the Söderkulla area of the city centre. The alarm was raised at 8:30am on Wednesday.

The male victim, 33, was due to testify at the trial a 30-year-old man charged with assault, drugs offences and drunk driving. The man was the alleged victim in the assault case.

The trial has now been called off, according to the Sydsvenskan newspaper.

Prosecutor Bo Albrektsson said that he believed that the 33-year-old had been reluctant to testify, but did not have reason to believe that he was scared or had been threatened.

According to Sydsvenskan, the victim was approached by two men who asked whether he was due to testify at the trial. When he confirmed that he was, he was shot by one of the men. The woman, 24, is believed to have been hit by the same bullet or by splinters from the bullet.

Witnesses have said they saw two men running from the scene.

“We are now looking for them. We are also going to interview the witnesses,” said Mikael Persson of Skåne Police.

Both victims were conscious when they arrived at the hospital. Police were on Wednesday morning conducting a search of the crime scene.

The Swedish Court Service underlines on its website the importance of ensuring the safety the 100,000 people who testify in trials each year. Courts use volunteers to support witnesses and offers the possibility for people to testify without the presence of a person of whom they are afraid. The possibility of permanent security checks at court entrances is currently being discussed.

– – – – – – – – –

The safety of witnesses and victims outside of court buildings is primarily the responsibility of the police, said Hjalmar Forsberg, chief justice at Stockholm District Court. He said it was very unusual for witnesses to be protected by being driven to court by police.

“I have known it to happen on a few occasions,” he said.

Forsberg said it was extremely important to ensure the safety of people due to appear in court:

“It is a disaster when something happens like that which has clearly just happened in Malmö,” he said.

Freedom Fighter has translated excerpts from a Swedish-language article from Sydsvenskan with more details about the trial witnesses who were shot:

Two injured in Malmö shooting

The victims were both shot in the leg at the bus stop on Erikfältsgatan, in the Söderkulla area of the city centre. The alarm was raised at 8:30am on Wednesday. Witnesses have said they saw two men running from the bus stop.

“We are now looking for them. We are also going to interview the witnesses,” said Mikael Persson of Skåne Police.

The male victim is 33, the woman is 24. Both were conscious when they arrived at the hospital. Police have not released any further information about the victims’ identity or revealed whether they know each other. They are expected to be interviewed when their injuries allow.

Police were on Wednesday morning conducting a search of the crime scene. Mikael Persson said it was too early to say what type of gun had been used or how many shots had been fired.

For a complete listing of previous enrichment news, see The Cultural Enrichment Archives.

Two weeks ago the Swedish artist Lars Vilks was physically attacked while giving a seminar at the University of Uppsala. His presentation featured a raunchy video that included suggestive images of gay men wearing Mohammed masks, and that was too much for the Muslims in the audience. One of them stormed the stage and head-butted Mr. Vilks, while the rest rose as one and chanted “Allahu Akhbar”. Needless to say, the remainder of the lecture was cancelled.

Several days later, to add insult to injury, Mr. Vilks’ house was vandalized and firebombed while he was away.

The University of Uppsala at first indicated that it was unlikely that Mr. Vilks’ seminar would be rescheduled on a later date, citing concerns about security. However, the university authorities have changed their minds, and now believe that adequate security for the event can be devised. Perhaps the university has borrowed some armored personnel carriers and Predator drones for the occasion.

According to The Local:

Vilks Invited to Complete Uppsala Lecture

Uppsala University has invited artist Lars Vilks to speak again after his lecture on May 11th was interrupted when he was attacked.

The university’s Department of Philosophy has asked Vilks to return to complete his lecture provided that the university’s security personnel, in consultation with the police, believes that it can take place in an orderly manner.

“It is a wise decision by the department,” Rector Anders Hallberg said in a statement. “It is obvious that he may complete his lecture.”

At the lecture, Vilks showed a movie with naked gay men wearing masks representing the prophet Muhammad. Three people were arrested, but released after the attack under investigation by police.

“Violence and intimidation will not silence people at the university or elsewhere in society,” the Department of Philosophy’s director of studies Rysiek Sliwinski said in a statement.

Vilks has accepted the invitation, Sliwinski added.

– – – – – – – – –

The lecture on freedom of expression and art will be held in the fall provided that it can take place in an orderly manner. The location, time and format have not yet been determined. A new safety assessment will be made in consultation with the police.

Following the attack at the lecture, Vilks’ house in the village of Nyhamnsläge in southern Sweden was attacked with gasoline-filled plastic bottles. A window in the house was smashed and a curtain was set on fire.

The artist’s personal website was also hacked, with an Islamic group calling itself Al Qataari claiming responsibility for the attack.

Vilks courted global attention in 2007 when the Swedish regional daily Nerikes Allehanda published his satirical cartoon depicting Muhammad as a dog to illustrate an editorial on the importance of freedom of expression.

The cartoon prompted protests by Muslims in the town of Örebro in central Sweden, where the newspaper is based, while Egypt, Iran and Pakistan made formal complaints.

An Al-Qaeda front organisation then offered $100,000 to anyone who murdered Vilks — with an extra $50,000 if his throat was slit — and $50,000 for the death of Nerikes Allehanda editor-in-chief Ulf Johansson.

The protests in Sweden echoed the uproar in Denmark caused by the publication in September 2005 of 12 drawings focused on Islam, including one showing the prophet Muhammad with a turban in the shape of a bomb.

In March, American citizen Colleen LaRose, who called herself “JihadJane” in a YouTube video, was charged by US authorities with conspiring to kill Vilks after seven suspected co-plotters were arrested in Ireland.

For previous posts on Lars Vilks and the Roundabout Dogs, see the Modoggie Archives.

Hat tip: TB.