Posted on 02/04/2006 3:59:32 AM PST by KentTrappedInLiberalSeattle
ISLAMABAD The furore in Europe and the Middle East over published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed escalated on Friday, with violent demonstrations taking place in many countries including Indonesia.
Some 100 members of the Front of the Defenders of Islam stormed a Jakarta office block housing the Danish Embassy, protesting the cartoons portraying the Prophet Mohammed and demanding death for the cartoonist.
Amassed outside the building, the mob chanted: "Let's go jihad! We're ready for jihad!" One of their banners read: "Let's slaughter the Danish ambassador!"
The group, mostly wearing their trademark white uniforms with skullcaps, broke through security to enter the building's lobby, where they smashed lamps and threw eggs, but were quickly ejected by police and their own leaders.
Several then pelted the embassy's external coat of arms with eggs.
Mr Maksuni, the leader of the protesters, said Ambassador Niels Andersen met with three representatives of the group and promised to issue an apology through the media in Indonesia, the world's largest Islamic country.
"The ambassador has agreed to apologise in the local electronic and print media in a day or two, after they have prepared a draft, which they will translate," he said.
"If they don't apologise as promised we will kick them out of the country, and we will ask the government to withdraw its ambassador from Denmark," he added.
Indonesian Vice-President Jusuf Kalla told reporters he had protested to the Danish envoy.
"Of course as Muslims we object to it and I have conveyed that message to the Danish ambassador," he said, adding however that the Danish government could not be held responsible for the cartoons because Denmark had a free press.
Several other Muslim leaders around the world including Afghanistan's president and the governments of Pakistan and Indonesia have all condemned the publication of the drawings, which appeared in Denmark last September and in other European newspapers this year. The controversial cartoons have enraged the Muslim world, which considers them blasphemous because Islamic tradition bans depictions of Prophet Mohammed and Allah.
In Malaysia, coverage of the controversy has been low-key. The opposition Parti Islam Se Malaysia, or PAS, said it would present a protest letter to the Danish embassy.
Meanwhile amid the anger and demonstrations, Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen stood his ground.
He said he could not apologise for the publication of the controversial cartoons, where newspapers are free of state control.
"A Danish government can never apologise on behalf of a free and independent newspaper," Mr Rasmussen told reporters after an hour-long meeting with 76 foreign diplomats to discuss a swelling row over the cartoons.
Commenting on a boycott of Danish goods in Muslim countries which has led to financial losses and job cuts, Mr Rasmussen said defending freedom was more important than defending his country's business interests.
"Of course the principle of freedom of expression is the most important principle for us," he said. "This is our priority number one."
Mr Rasmussen said it was in everybody's interest to reduce global tension over the cartoons, which have been picked up by other European newspapers and which have led to massive demonstrations against Danes and other Europeans.
Danish flags have been burnt, ambassadors recalled, Danish products boycotted and threats made to Scandinavians in Muslim countries.
"I think it's in our mutual interest to calm down the situation. If the protests in the streets escalate further, it may have unpredictable repercussions on all the affected countries, and the problem could grow to a more global problem," Mr Rasmussen warned.
His words did not go down well with many Muslims around the world.
The firestorm of reaction spread through the Middle East, where two armed groups threatened to target Danes, French and Norwegians in the region.
Palestinian gunmen besieged the European Union headquarters in the Gaza Strip and scrawled "Closed until apology is made to the Muslims" on the gate of the building, which did not open for business for fear of violence. Norway closed its West Bank mission, saying it was taking the threats "very seriously".
Jordanian tabloid Al Shihan defiantly published three of the cartoons, but its publisher pulled all copies from the newsstands and fired its editor-in-chief.
The BBC broadcast the images on its main evening bulletins and its senior executives said they would not be "bullied or censored" into dropping them.
"It is entirely a matter for the media organisations to decide what they want to do within the law," said a spokesman for British Prime Minister Tony Blair. "It is for people to reach their own judgments."
Nice of the mooooooslims to make the cartoonists point. Ironic, eh??
We have found the soft underbelly of the enemy!
DRAW MORE CARTOONS!
Carolyn
THese people are total bloody morons!
Pretty immature aren't they? If ever a culture needed reforming or maybe, erasure, it's this one.
BRUSSELS JOURNAL.com: "'THE WAR IS ON'" (ARTICLE SNIPPET: "Yesterday (Thursday) Mullah Krekar, the alleged leader of the Islamist group Ansar al-Islam who has been living in Norway as a refugee since 1991, said that the publication of the Muhammad cartoons was a declaration of war. "The war has begun," he told Norwegian journalists. Mr Krekar said Muslims in Norway are preparing to fight. "It does not matter if the governments of Norway and Denmark apologize, the war is on.") (February 3, 2006)
ISLAMONLINE.net: Cairo - "WARNINGS CARTOONS RISK VIOLENCE" (ARTICLE SNIPPET: "The blasphemous cartoons of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) by a Danish daily and other European newspapers are risking to trigger acts of violence around the world, officials and commentators warn." (February 2, 2006)
I'm not much of an artist but over the next day or so I think I'm going to try and come up with my own cartoon. I think as a patriotic duty every FReeper should try to do the same. Here's what I think is a free site FReepers can use to upload and host their creations if they so desire:
http://imageshack.us/
Muslims are proving that most are violent and want to murder over the least provocation. Its good that governments and non-muslims are seeing the true characteristics of this cult. Maybe it will open some eyes that have been closed to their violent proclivities. They belong in the Middle East and not spread throughout the world where they only cause troubles wherever they go.
Maybe an all-out war against Muslims is what they want. Sounds good to me.
The whole of islam is a cartoon and these idiots are proving that fact.
The Muslim world (over 1 billion of them) is expressing rage at the publication of cartoons........where was the world wide Christian outrage (demonstrations, burnings and threats of killing and destruction) when Muslims were beheading Christians on video and broadcasting for the whole world to see?
IMHO Islam is like a plague that is in need of elimination.
I am LMAO over your comment!
morons they may be, but at this time, they seem to be driving the entire planets agenda. when they do act, it will be written that the west is at fault and islam will be further strenghtened. its almost otherworldly.
Time for our State Department spokesman to issue another statement of support for these rabid devil protesters, hey?
Agreed, but who is to blame for that?
Our left-wing 'friends' are allowing that to happen.
Ping
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