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Fri Feb 10 12:39:06 PST 2006

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MUTUAL INCOMPREHENSION, MUTUAL OUTRAGE
Feb 10th 2006  

Global protests over cartoons of Muhammad, and the jailing of a Muslim
in Britain for inciting murder, reveal once more the gulf between Islam
and the West

WHEN, last September, the Danish newspaper JYLLANDS-POSTEN published a
dozen cartoons of the prophet Muhammad, it knew it was testing the
limits of free speech and good taste. But it could never have imagined
how much. For Denmark itself, this has been the biggest crisis since
the Nazi occupation during the second world war. But the implications
for the already vexed relations between the West and Islam go far
wider. Denmark's prime minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, summed it up:
"We are today facing a global crisis that has the potential to escalate
beyond the control of governments."

At least ten people have died so far in protests against the cartoons.
Several were killed in Afghanistan as police shot into a crowd
besieging a Norwegian peacekeepers' base. More were shot dead as they
tried to storm an American military base in the south of the country,
setting cars alight and hurling rocks. The protests continued on Friday
in Bangladesh, Afghanistan, Iran, India, Kenya and several other
countries. In Malaysia a massive demonstration erupted as a conference
on relations between the West and Islam got under way. Speaking at the
meeting, Malaysia's prime minister, Abdullah Badawi, talked of a "huge
chasm that has emerged between the West and Islam." 

Western embassies in Syria, Lebanon, Indonesia and Iran have been
attacked. Mosque sermons from Senegal to Sumatra have blasted the
insult to the faith. Demonstrators in Karachi burned an effigy of the
Danish prime minister. In Khartoum, some enraged marchers among a crowd
of 50,000 chanted "Strike, strike, bin Laden." Saudi Arabia, Syria,
Libya and Iran have all withdrawn their ambassadors from Denmark. Iran
has formally banned imports from Denmark, while consumer boycotts
across the Middle East have emptied supermarket shelves of all Danish
products. 

Western governments have reacted with shock and muddle. There is a
growing feeling in continental Europe that Britain and America should
have taken a principled stand on grounds of free speech, but have
failed. In France, home to Europe's biggest Muslim minority--roughly
10% of the population--there has been surprise at the relatively
conciliatory response of Jack Straw, Britain's foreign secretary, who
called the publication of the cartoons "insensitive" and "unnecessary".
Many in France are baffled at the reluctance of the British and
American press to publish the cartoons themselves. (On February 8th,
three editors and a reporter quit the NEW YORK PRESS over a decision
not to reprint the cartoons, and President George Bush called on world
governments to stop the violence and be "respectful".) 

To be sure, the official French reaction has been measured. President
Jacques Chirac declared that freedom of expression was "one of the
foundations of the republic" but added a plea for "respect and
moderation" in its application. And one editor at FRANCE-SOIR, a small
newspaper that was the first to claim the "right to caricature God",
was sacked after publishing all 12 caricatures. Yet it seemed that the
paper's owner, a Franco-Egyptian, had been seeking an excuse to get rid
of him anyway. The rest of the press, along with those who see the
matter as a test case of the ability of French democracy to withstand
the demands of political Islam, have taken an increasingly muscular
position. 

Several big national papers, including LE MONDE and LIBeRATION, have
republished some of the cartoons to make a point about their right to
do so. This week they were joined by CHARLIE HEBDO, a satirical
weekly--despite a last-minute attempt to secure an injunction against
it by several French Muslim organisations. CHARLIE HEBDO reprinted a
text from the Manifesto of Liberties Association, a French secular
Muslim body, arguing that the orchestrated violence was a warning to
Europe's Muslims from abroad that "You don't have the right to think
'like Europeans'", and urging the West to reaffirm Europe's tradition
of free thought.

That some offence should be taken is understandable. The Muslim
injunction against picturing recognised prophets is well known. Yet the
point of proscribing images is to ensure that they do not become
objects of worship in themselves. Muslims generally shrug indifferently
at Christian representations of Jesus or Moses, both of whom Islam also
venerates. 

In this case, however, the caricaturing of Muhammad was clearly meant
as a challenge. Several of the images were frankly insulting,
particularly those that pictured the Muslim prophet as a terrorist. It
adds to the sense, which has grown among Muslims since America launched
its war on terror after September 11th, 2001, that their faith itself
is being branded as violent and criminal. In addition, pious Muslims
believe that Muhammad, while mortal, is the embodiment of manly
perfection; at the same time a prophet, a moral example and a political
leader. "He is not a believer", runs one of the prophet's sayings, "if
he does not love me more than his father or son or all people."

Muslims worldwide have also grown keenly sensitive to what they see as
western double standards. Freedom of speech is an admirable thing, says
a Syrian member of parliament, but why do European countries forbid
questioning of the Holocaust? Why are Muslim preachers jailed for
incitement while anti-Muslim slurs go unpunished? And why, as a natural
extension of this thought, does the West ignore Israel's atomic arsenal
while questioning Iran's nuclear ambitions? 

At the same time there is little understanding, in many Muslim
countries, either of how Western democracies function, or how they have
evolved historically towards enshrining maximum personal freedom.
Danish protests that there are no laws empowering the government to
intervene are met with disbelief. In both Yemen and Jordan, editors who
republished the cartoons (which have now appeared in 22 different
countries) were promptly arrested and their newspapers shut down. 

LEADERS AND MANIPULATORS
Some protests seem to have been spontaneous; others have been
deliberately manipulated by Islamist elements. While demonstrations
have been widespread, the number of participants has generally not been
large. Moderate leaders, from Iraq's foremost Shia authority, Grand
Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, to Ekmeleddin Ihsanoglu, who heads the
Organisation of Islamic Conferences, have called for Muslims to express
their feelings peacefully. A FATWA issued by Egypt's highly respected
grand mufti, Ali Gomaa, states that Muslims should understand that
others will attack their faith; and although they should reject this
"perverted behaviour", he said, they should protest peacefully, with
"wisdom and fair exhortation". 

This stand presents a clear contrast to the rabble-rousing tactics used
by others. A Danish imam, Abu Laban, may have started the whole thing
by touring the Middle East to drum up outrage, including distributing
far more offensive cartoons of the Prophet (as a pig, as a paedophile)
which he said had been "received" by Muslims in Denmark. Iran's supreme
guide described the furore as a plot "concocted by Zionists angered by
the victory of Hamas in the Palestinian elections"--though the
Palestinian vote took place four months after the publication of the
cartoons. 

In Syria, a police state allied to Iran where rioters have torched the
Danish and Norwegian embassies, witnesses noted men with walkie-talkies
directing the crowds. Security was so ineffectual that camera crews
accompanied arsonists into the buildings. In neighbouring Lebanon,
authorities say that one-third of the 400 people arrested for setting
fire to the Danish embassy and vandalising the surrounding Christian
district were Syrians. On Wednesday Condoleezza Rice, America's
secretary of state, remarked that Iran and Syria had so stirred up the
violence for their own ends that "the world ought to call them on it."
On Friday the Palestinian militant group Islamic Jihad, which has
carried out several suicide attacks in Israel, threatened more violence.

Some analysts have speculated that the Muslim Brotherhood, a global
fraternity of Islamist groups with branches in some 70 countries, may
have a hand in the uproar. This is unlikely. The most vigorous
Palestinian protests, for example, were led by militants from
ostensibly secular Fatah, not Hamas, a Brotherhood offshoot. Protests
in other Brotherhood strongholds, such as Egypt, Jordan and Morocco,
have been relatively muted. A Brotherhood spokesman in Egypt accused
some politicians of playing a "dirty game...to distort the image of the
Islamic movement--to get the people to say they are not peaceful, not
democratic, against free speech."

It is more likely that Islamist forces of varying stripes have seized
the opportunity both to assert their presence and to reinforce the
sense of Muslim embattlement that suits their goals. Recent electoral
advances by Islamists, in Turkey, Iraq and Egypt as well as Palestine,
had already emboldened these forces. Other competing voices, too, have
found the cartoon issue an ideal platform for promoting their version
of the faith. On Egyptian television, one dapper preacher aimed a
sermon at the West, urging westerners to love Muhammad; another, his
rival for ratings, advised Muslims to dedicate a two-day fast to the
victory of their prophet. 

Some Muslims find all the hullabaloo distressing. "What it shows is
that we lack confidence," says the headmaster of a Cairo school. "If we
were confident about our faith we wouldn't have to react so
hysterically." Many others, however, feel it marks an important
precedent. In a Friday sermon at the Grand Mosque in the holy city of
Mecca, Saleh bin Humaid, a Saudi preacher, extolled the spirit of
defiance that was unifying Muslims. "A great new spirit is flowing
through the body of the Islamic nation," he said. "The world can no
longer ignore the nation and its feelings."

By midweek, moderate Muslims in Denmark, Britain and elsewhere were
appealing for calm. Cool-headed leaders, including clerics in
Indonesia, the most populous Muslim country, urged restraint.
International efforts were also under way to ease tension. A joint
statement issued on Tuesday by the United Nations, the Organisation of
the Islamic Conferences and the EU condemned violent protests while
calling for respect for religion. The EU's foreign-policy supremo,
Javier Solana, said he would travel to Arab and Muslim countries to try
to calm their anger. He may be gone for some time.

See this article with graphics and related items at http://www.economist.com/agenda/displaystory.cfm?story_id=5501066&fsrc=nwl

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