Honestly, the thing is – I understand your anger, and I understand why many muslim *fanatics* in the arab world react the way they do. However, the incident occured in a civilized European country with its own laws. Denmark and countries as such can’t be expected to pander to every minority group that is welcomed and then DISRESPECTS the local customs and way of life, which in this case allows for the publication of said cartoons.

And to all the protesters in Europe: Honestly if some muslims feel they are treated worse in Europe than wherever they came from, by all means, go back and live in an islamic society which for some reason you got the hell away from in the first place… You hate it when the US tries to impose its world view on you – so DON’T try to impose yours.

Whosoever kills a man, except those who murder and spread corrumption in the land, it shall be as if he had killed all humanity, and whoso saves the life of a man, it shall be as if he had saved the life of all humanity.

The very next line, 5:33:

The punishment for those who make war upon Allah and His messenger and spread corruption in the land will be that they will be killed or crucified, or have their hands and feet on alternate sides cut off, or will be expelled out of the land. Such will be their degradation in this world and the next; theirs will be an awful doom.

Are publishing the cartoons a form of corruption in the land Maria? From what I have shown here, and what I have seen muslims do recently…I think we all realize how much muslims love the prophet. That is precisely what scares me.

you will realize how true what I am saying is. Ask any youth, be he heedless or pious; ask any Muslim anywhere, in Bangladesh, Pakistan, Yemen or in Egypt or any part of the world where Muslims are Living . Ask any Muslim in any village regardless of how religious he is, be he an obedient Muslim or not, a drug user or not, successful in his life or a failure, old or young, ask them, what does Allah’s Messenger (SAWS) mean to you?

You also said: “…why dont the newspapers print cartoons offending other religions ( jews, christians, buddists etc).”
They do. All the time, – the reason you don’t know about this (or pretend not to) is that most people of these religions don’t freak out on the same scale as muslims do.

BTW, In your 5 or six paragraphs you said nothing to refute the points brought up by jimmy the dhimmi and other posters about mohammed… I wonder why?

I think the protest is fully justified but it should be peaceful one. If any body exercise evil rights to ignite one big community the responsibility lies with him. If I know that if I put my hand in the fire it will burn then should I put it there. The cartoonist knew that there would be reaction but he did it. So reaction is normal expression of Muslims.

I think this cartoon should never have been published. Everyone has freedom of speech but publishing this cartoon was not about freedom of speech it was about offending. There is a limit to everything. Some non-muslims think we are over-reacting, well how would they feel if we did this to someone that was this special to them in their religion or family. They have no idea about our religion what gives them the right to mock and abuse our prophet like this?We have every right to be angry.

The philisophy of every religion is ‘live and let others live’. Unfortunately, the world is messed up in religious war these days. Publishing such cartoon in national newspaper in the name of freedom of speech is in itself an irresponsible behaviour.

with all this talk abut freedom of speech, why dont the newspapers print cartoons offending other religions ( jews, christians, buddists etc). But the newspapers int he west wont, they wiil only print cartoons offending islam and not any ither religions.

Has anyone else noticed the double standard of many western people over freedom of expression? When the western media publishes an extremist, islamaphobic cartoon and muslims object, they claim that it is their right under freedom of press/expression. But then, when Islamic extremists express their views in the protests in London and across the Islamic world, the west is up in arms. I do not condone or support either of these things, but I think it is clear that there is hipocracy here.

Freedoms bring responsibilities, and while I do support free speech, I can only think that publishing such cartoons is really unwise, irresponsible and stupid. People saying publishing these cartoons is good should learn why muslims find them offensive. If free speech means the right to cause offence, then people too have the right to be offended. It works both ways.

Christians, Hindus, etc. have committed atrocities, but the acts and those who perpetrated them have been condemned by their religious community as a whole. So far, that hasn’t happened with the Islamic community

Why was my post tactless? You make the statement about the lack of self-criticism amongst the islamic community as a whole but you don’t seem to wonder why. I argue that there is something about the ideology of Islam itself that is different from Christianity, Hinduism ect.. that lends itself to the justification of violent acts, the lack of free speech, misogyny ect. even in the 21st century.

The paradox is, the only way for muslims to cure the pathology that is the lack of self-criticism…is to be self critical. They must look at the hadiths like the one I mentioned and say, “you know what, Mohammad was not a good guy by today’s standards (or even by medeival standards!)” or “God, that Koran has some awful stuff in it!”

Religious muslims cannot do that because it is the basic tenet of Islamic theology that the Koran is the direct, uninterpretable, undenyable word of God, spoken to the prophet (in arabic!) and is a covenant (set of laws) for all mankind throughout all ages.

Also, Muhammad is the al-insan al-kamil, or the perfect man, and an example for all men. When the most perfect role model of all time killed those who blasphemed him, what are devout muslims supposed to do about these cartoons?

Christians, Hindus, etc. have committed atrocities, but the acts and those who perpetrated them have been condemned by their religious community as a whole. So far, that hasn’t happened with the Islamic community, and until it does (and loudly) most will continue to equate Islam with terrorism and oppression. Can you blame them?

What do you think about the several Hadiths that chronicle the assasination of the poetess Asma bint Marwan on the orders of Mohammad himself(pbuh) because of her mockery and criticisms of the prophet, circa 627 A.D. ?

for example, Ibn Ishaq writes (pp675-676):

When the apostle heard what she had said he said, “Who will rid me of Marwan’s daughter?” `Umayr b. `Adiy al-Khatmi who was with him heard him, and that very night he went to her house and killed her. In the morning he came to the apostle and told him what he had done and he said, “You have helped God and His apostle, O `Umayr!” When he asked if he would have to bear any evil consequences the apostle said, “Two goats won’t butt their heads about her,” so `Umayr went back to his people.

According to accepted Muslim scriptures, Mohammad (pbuh) ordered the assasination of at least 22 poets, artists, and pundits simply for their mockery and criticism of the early Islamic movement.

I don’t think the riots and embassy burnings and death-threats are anything more than an interpretation of sacred religious duty by traditionalist muslims.