Pakistan’s Domestic Cartoon Crisis

We’re accustomed to Islamic outrage over blasphemous cartoons, but the latest cartoon crisis in Pakistan is unusual: the offending cartoon appeared in a Muslim newspaper, was presumably drawn by a Muslim, and the blasphemy involved is entirely Muslim-on-Muslim.

The Salafists who object to the cartoon are engaging in the time-honored practice of takfir: declaring other Muslims to be apostates and deserving of death due to an alleged lack of Islamic purity or zeal. The plight of Najam Sethi is a reminder that infidels are not the only ones facing death fatwas for blasphemy, and the Mr. Sethi is to be commended for his courage.

According to the Times Online:

Death threat for editor Najam Sethi over Islamic cartoon

Letter from Taleban orders journalist to repent

A newspaper editor has received death threats from militant groups for publishing a cartoon of a radical woman Islamic leader encouraging her pupils to wage holy war.

Najam Sethi, chief editor of the Daily Times, one of Pakistan’s most respected English language newspapers and its sister paper Daily Aaj Kal, now moves under heavy security after ultra-conservative Islamic elements warned him of serious consequences if he did not repent. His house in Lahore is now guarded by six army commandos.

– – – – – – – –

The threats were provoked by the publication of a cartoon in Aaj Kal depicting Umme Hassan, principal of a radical women’s madrassa, in a veil “educating” female students to wage jihad and embrace martyrdom.

Ms Hassan is the wife of Abdul Aziz, the prayer leader of the Red Mosque in Islamabad, who was jailed after the mosque was stormed by Pakistani troops last year. The madrassa she headed was demolished in the operation in which more than 100 people, including 11 soldiers, were killed. Addressing a rally on the anniversary of the Red Mosque raid in Islamabad last week, Ms Hassan declared that the cartoon was blasphemous, equating it with Danish cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad.

Other clerics of the Red Mosque argued that since Ms Hassan was teaching the Koran to her students in the mosque, any attempt to belittle her was blasphemous. [emphasis added]

The interesting thing about this incident is that the charge of blasphemy has been extended beyond Allah and Mohammed to include ordinary human beings. If one can be blasphemous towards Ms. Hassan, then by implication she is being worshipped as if she were herself a god. This is a great heresy in Islam, but apparently the rules may be bent freely by true believers in service of the greater good.

Nothing could illustrate more clearly the totalitarian political nature of the Islamic cult. Just as in communism or fascism, there is no rule within its own canon of orthodoxy that it will not break if doing so will maintain or extend the power of the totalitarian elite. The mujahideen of the Taliban and Al Qaeda are the “revolutionary vanguard”, and are exempt from any rules that might apply to mere mortals.

Najam Sethi is a reminder that decency and courage still exist among Muslims, who after all constitute the majority of the victims of Islamic tyranny.

Mr Sethi, who received the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) International Press Freedom award in 1999, has been an outspoken critic of Islamic extremism. AntiTaleban articles published in his papers have provoked strong reactions from militants. “By accusing the paper of blaspheming and including me in the category of antiIslamic elements the clerics have provoked people to kill me and my staff,” Mr Sethi said.

[…]

Mr Sethi has rejected the suggestion by authorities to stay out of the country until the situation is calmer.

“Extremists have always used coercion to silence their critics and that is exactly what is happening now,” he said. “This is a battle that media and country cannot afford to lose.”

I haven’t been able to locate a copy of the blasphemous cartoon. If anybody can find it, please let us know, so that we can post it in solidarity with Najam Sethi, just as we did with the Motoons and Jyllands-Posten.



Hat tip: TB.

8 thoughts on “Pakistan’s Domestic Cartoon Crisis

  1. The sad thing is that the relatively peaceable MINOs (Muslims in name only) are the victims here. The only good Muslim is a MINO.

  2. Mr. Sethi should be commended for his actions, and use this incident to illustrate the hypocrisy of the head choppers.
    He may be a good example of what is called a Kafirized Muslim.
    “The name kafirized Muslim acknowledges that we are dealing with a person, not a category.

    The usual names, (good Muslim, moderate Muslim), attempt to credit the good found in Muslims to the doctrine of Islam. The term kafirized Muslim clearly states that the good comes from the kafirs, not Islam.”

  3. Muslims have no problems killing other Muslims for whatever cause they have going….just look at Iraq and all the Muslims killing Muslims in suicide bombings. It is all about control and power, and Muslim terrorists, under whatever banner they chose to walk under, decide who and how they are going to control the masses.

    This man should be commended for his courage in standing up to the terrorists. What Pakistan needs is more people to do the same….it isn’t like there aren’t a lot of people there who could back him up if they had the courage to do so.

  4. Other clerics of the Red Mosque argued that since Ms Hassan was teaching the Koran to her students in the mosque, any attempt to belittle her was blasphemous.

    Priceless. The logical conclusion of this requires the beheading of anyone who misspells a single Islamic word.

    Make sure to note that no criticism of “Umme Hassan, principal of a radical women’s madrassa, in a veil “educating” female students to wage jihad and embrace martyrdom”. But instead that there was any ridicule of jihad and martyrdom being taught to young people.

    Just as in communism or fascism, there is no rule within its own canon of orthodoxy that it will not break if doing so will maintain or extend the power of the totalitarian elite.

    This is the indelible birthmark of naked unadorned evil. There is absolutely ZERO irony that it manifests not only in Islam but in that other brat of Satan as well, the EU.

    “By accusing the paper of blaspheming and including me in the category of antiIslamic elements the clerics have provoked people to kill me and my staff,” Mr Sethi said.

    Please pardon me if I don’t get all choked up here. Mr. Sethi is merely experiencing the logical extension of being a Muslim. Participation in Islam’s spiritual farce automatically means that your life is forfeit. While this is implicit in Islam’s obsession with martyrdom, far fewer Muslims understand the final implication that they are nothing more than cannon fodder. All that remains to be seen is whether Islam itself or the West converts them into that fodder.

  5. Why is it that they have “one of the most respected English language newspapers in pakistan”,and yet the moment these savages alight upon our shores,they suddenly all need interpreters?

  6. Shoprat,

    The sad thing is that the relatively peaceable MINOs (Muslims in name only) are the victims here. The only good Muslim is a MINO.

    Well in the context of a Muslim country they are. However in the context of a Western country a MINO is someone who is not unlikely to give birth the many radicalized Muslim children, someone how is still part of the Muslim head count that makes the hubris of the Jihadists grow, someone who might come back after a trip to Pakistan with a big beard and a Koran under his arm. MINO’s are still part of the Islamic organism, and after all we are not even able to tell who is who.

    The only good Muslim is an ex-Muslim.

  7. Con Swede: MINO’s are still part of the Islamic organism, and after all we are not even able to tell who is who.

    At day’s end, this is the cross that Islam must be crucified upon, as it were. Taqiyya permanently and irrevocably damns Islam. There will never any way to trust Muslims. Even those who vocally disavow taqiyya could still be practicing taqiyya. There will never any way of knowing for sure.

    Excusing the crime of taqiyya carries with it the penalty of Sudden Jihad Syndrome. A self-imposed death sentence is too prohibitive a price to pay for Muslim’s who demand that they should be immune to the rules of ethics and common law.

  8. “The only good Muslim is an ex-Muslim.” Indeed, Muslim-Light doesn’t exist. Muslim “ignorants”, who are not fully aware of the consequences do though:

    “Research by the Roy Morgan group found that 53 percent of Indonesians support the national introduction of sharia law. […] However, that figure was especially low given that of Indonesia’s population of 230 million people, more than 95 per cent identify as Muslims.” […] “A lot of people think the idea (sharia) is very good, but when you start talking of everyday implications, the number dropped.”

    Those who confront will help open the “ignorants'” eyes (and be threatened for that), those who appease will turn “ignorants” into radicals (and taken care of later).

Comments are closed.