Muslims say West media hypocritical in cartoon row

By Miral Fahmy

DUBAI (Reuters) – Muslims have decried as hypocrites
Western dailies which have cited free speech as the reason for
printing disrespectful cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad, saying
the same newspapers take pains to avoid lampooning Jews.

The caricatures, first published in a Danish daily in
September and then reprinted across Europe, have unleashed fury
among Muslims who view any portrayal of their Prophet as
blasphemous, let alone one showing him as a terrorist.

What is really insulting, some Muslim clerics and
politicians say, is that Europeans do not think twice about
denigrating Islam but view ridicule of Judaism as anti-Semitic.

“What about freedom of expression when anti-Semitism is
involved? Then it is not freedom of expression. Then it is a
crime,” said Arab League chief Amr Moussa.

“But when Islam is insulted, certain powers … raise the
issue of freedom of expression. Freedom of expression should be
one yardstick, not two or three,” he said, adding that the
Danish cartoons showed European disdain for Arabs and Muslims.

One cartoon shows the Prophet wearing a bomb-shaped turban.

“The double standards are as clear as the sun,” said Abdul
Latif Arabiyat, a senior member of Jordan’s main Islamist
party.

“They (Europeans) don’t dare lampoon the Holocaust or their
own sacred religious symbols but sanction attacks on our sacred
values. They only hold implacable enmity toward Islam.”

Prominent Saudi cleric Sheikh Abdel Aziz al-Qassim said the
concept of absolute freedom existed nowhere in the world.

“Freedom does not give anyone the right to insult prophets
or religion,” he said. “Freedom comes with responsibility and
that means respect for Islam.”

VIOLENCE DENOUNCED

Many Muslims consider the caricatures as the latest volley
in what they see as a Western campaign against their faith,
citing France’s headscarf ban and Western dismay at the
election victory of Palestinian Islamist group Hamas.

“We should not believe a single word of what European
newspaper editors say about the sanctity of free speech,” wrote
columnist Faisal Jaloul in Gulf Arab daily al-Khaleej.

“Suffice to say that the … printing of the cartoons stems
from a determination to offend and the belief that Arabs and
Muslims are weak and their sanctities irrelevant.”

Since the uproar over the cartoons erupted earlier this
year, angry Muslim protesters have ransacked Danish, Swedish
and Norwegian diplomatic missions and burned countless Danish
flags.

However, many Muslims have protested peacefully, with some
expressing their anger through a boycott of Danish goods.

Several top Muslim clerics, including those in Egypt and
Saudi Arabia, the birthplace of Islam, have condemned the
attacks.

Iraq’s top Shi’ite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani,
criticized Islamic militant groups for distorting and
manipulating the faith.

Some of the worst violence has taken place in Iran and
Syria, which are at loggerheads with the West.

Some Muslims applauded when Iran’s top-selling newspaper
launched a competition this week to find the best cartoon about
the Holocaust. But others said they feared their protest
campaign was being hijacked to score political points.

“If we want to be respected, we must respect others,” said
Fadi Shalah, a Lebanese businessman. “And burning embassies in
the name of our Prophet is the ultimate insult.”

(Reporting by Paul Hughes in Tehran, Tom Perry in Cairo,
Suleiman al-Khalidi in Amman, Allyn Fisher-Ilan in Jerusalem,
Haitham Haddadin in Kuwait, Andrew Hammond in Saudi)