Marching To Dhimmitude

The State Department has decided to give its opinion of free speech as it applies to the publication of cartoons satirizing Islam and Mohammed in Europe. Surprisingly, the department that represents America and its ideals of freedom abroad has decided to take this opportunity to scold the publishers rather than the angry mobs calling for violence:

Washington on Friday condemned caricatures in European newspapers of the Prophet Mohammad, siding with Muslims who are outraged that the publications put press freedom over respect for religion.

By inserting itself into a dispute that has become a lightning rod for anti-European sentiment across the Muslim world, the United States could help its own battered image among Muslims.

"These cartoons are indeed offensive to the belief of Muslims," State Department spokesman Kurtis Cooper said in answer to a question. "We all fully recognize and respect freedom of the press and expression but it must be coupled with press responsibility. Inciting religious or ethnic hatreds in this manner is not acceptable."

 

Is that how free speech works? We have the right to say and print whatever we want ... until it offends someone, and then it's unacceptable? I'm not advocating that the State Department should have endorsed the cartoons themselves, but one would expect America to at least stand for the right of publication and the necessity of sometimes offending people in order to produce the necessary change for progress.

Would the State Department have apologized to Nazis in 1938 for depictions of Hitler as a lunatic? It would have offended millions of German fascists. Have they demanded an end to artists' depictions of Jesus and Mary in elephant dung and urine? No, and they shouldn't. Let the Christians protest these artists and boycott those who exhibit their wares, but America should at least acknowledge the rights of the artists to produce and others to privately publish these images.

If this is some sort of lame attempt to win credibility among Muslims, it's pathetic on two counts. First, it simply won't work -- we've interceded on their behalf before (in the Balkans, for instance) and it didn't win us any brownie points at all. More importantly, it sells out a critical component of what makes America and its freedoms so compelling. Volunteering for dhimmitude does nothing but encourage the Islamist lunatics, something we'd hoped that the State Department had learned by now.

The Cartoon Network

Muslims around the world have banded together to violently protest the publication of cartoons depicting Mohammed and other aspects of Islam, threatening attacks on Europeans and their newspapers if apologies do not come soon, the Guardian (UK) reports. European leaders have taken their normal stance in defence of Western freedoms; they're apologizing for them:

Europe's political elite were scrambling last night to contain the furore across the Arab world at the publication of caricatures of Muhammad, with leaders stressing that freedom of the press did not mean freedom to cause offence.

With newspaper editors in half a dozen countries unrepentant at the decision to republish cartoons depicting the prophet, EU commissioners stepped in to berate the press and try to calm Muslim anger.

Anders Fogh Rasmussen, the prime minister of Denmark, where the cartoons were first published last autumn, said in an interview with al-Arabiya television that there had been no intention to offend. "We deeply respect all religions, including Islam, and it is important for me to tell you that the Danish people have no intention to offend Muslims," he said.

The EU also entered the fray. Peter Mandelson, the trade commissioner, said that newspapers had been deliberately provocative in republishing the drawings. Franco Frattini, the EU justice commissioner, said that the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten had been "imprudent" to publish the 12 cartoons on September 30. Publication was wrong, he said, "even if the satire used was aimed at a distorted interpretation of religion, such as that used by terrorists to recruit young people, sometimes to the point of sending them into action as suicide bombers".

Even Kofi Annan, the UN secretary general, was drawn into the debate, saying that freedom of the press should not be an excuse for insulting religions.

But not everyone was acquiescent. France's interior minister, Nicolas Sarkozy, said he preferred "an excess of caricature to an excess of censure".

 

I'm no fan of excessive offense against religion, but the civilized method of protest is boycott and debate, not threats of violence, kidnapping, and murder. In the Palestinian territories, bands of armed thugs raided hotels looking for Europeans to hold hostage. Iran demanded explanations from the Austrian ambassador (Austria holds the EU presidency). In Indonesia and Pakistan, the protestors demanded violence against Denmark and France, and Muslim nations around the world spent their legislative time condemning the cartoons.

It is beyond disappointing that the EU and national leaders in Europe do not show the same courage as the editors of these publications. How difficult is it to defend free speech? If the Muslims don't like it, let them use the same freedom of speech to protest the publication by arguing against it on its merits, not by threatening death to anyone who breaks the tenets of their faith.

And while we're at it, let's ask our Exempt Media why they suddenly have too much "respect" to show images that might provide religious offense. Where were they when Chris Ofili created his dung-filled portrait of the Virgin Mary, or when Andres Serrano dunked a cruficix into a beaker of his own urine and called it art? They spent their efforts on publishing those images and praising the courage of the artists. Oh, but wait, there was one difference: Christians called for boycotts, not kidnappings and murders for the editors.

Perhaps the Exempt Media could at least publish this one cartoon that portrays Mohammed as smarter than most of his followers:

Too bad the protestors can't take this advice. Too bad that EU leadership and the American media show such reluctance to defend free speech and the people's right to know when it needs defending most. Too bad that these bastions of Western thought could be so cowed by the Cartoon Network.

The Sun Rose In The East Today, Too

Another day brings yet another statement from Hamas that they will never recognize the "Zionist state that was established on our land," making it ever more difficult to insist that the terrorist group will moderate their position. The good news? They've offered Israel a hudna:

Defying international pressure, the militant Islamic group Hamas said on Friday it will never recognize Israel but might be willing to negotiate terms for a temporary truce with the Jewish state.

Khaled Meshaal, the top leader of Hamas which won last week's Palestinian parliamentary election by a landslide, made the offer to Israel via a column titled "To whom it may concern," published in the al-Hayat al-Jadida newspaper.

"We will never recognize the legitimacy of the Zionist state that was established on our land," Meshaal, the Damascus-based head of the political and military wings of the militant Islamic group, wrote in the column. ...

They have said they might heed a truce with Israel as an interim measure that could include the establishment of a Palestinian state in the Gaza Strip and occupied West Bank, but would not abandon a long-term goal to destroy Israel.

"If you (Israel) are willing to accept the principle of a long-term truce then we will be ready to negotiate with you over the conditions of such a truce," Meshaal wrote.

 

I see this as the Dread Pirate Roberts offer of peace. Fans of the movie The Princess Bride will recall that Wesley tells Buttercup about his uneasy relationship with his captor after being made the pirate's valet. Every night as Wesley went to bed, the pirate told him, "Good night, Wesley. Fine job. I'll most likely kill you in the morning."

The Hamas offer is the most honest attempt at a hudna that Muslims have recently made. The truce only lasts while the Muslim can take advantage of it and strengthens his position at the expense of his enemy. It does not lead to peace, but only postpones conflict until the time of the Islamist's choosing. Hamas insists that they will eventually destroy Israel, but wants to offer peace as long as Hamas can consolidate its power in Gaza and the West Bank.

Elsewhere, Reuters reports that the US will probably start releasing funds so that Hamas does not turn to Iran for funding. That's almost as dumb as accepting a hudna. The point isn't to co-opt Iran as a bankroller of terrorist groups -- the point is to stop terrorist groups from getting funding at all. Hamas already gets money from Iran anyway. Receiving American dollars on top of that won't lead to moderation on the part of Hamas, but embolden them towards more aggression, and give them the means to pay for it as well.

Cut off the funds to Palestine. Make the people there understand that with democracy comes responsibility for the choices made -- and that choosing a terrorist group to run one's country brings severe consequences to one's global standing.

The Gazan 'Freedom Fighters'

Palestinians in the Gaza Strip sent a message to Europeans that belies the latter's belief in the desire for freedom in the former. Gunmen forced the EU office in Gaza City to close and warned that it will remain shut until the EU apologizes for several publications running caricatures of Mohammed and Muslims this week:

Palestinian gunmen Thursday shut down the European Union's office in Gaza City, demanding an apology for German, French and Norwegian newspapers reprinting cartoons featuring the prophet Mohammad, Palestinian security sources said.

The gunmen left a notice on the EU office's door that the building would remain closed until Europeans apologize to Muslims, many of whom consider the cartoons offensive. ...

Masked members of the militant groups Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Al Aqsa Martyrs Brigades, the armed wing of the Palestinian's former ruling party, Fatah, fired bullets into the air, and a man read the group's demands.

Palestinian officials said the gunmen were threatening to kidnap European workers if the European Union did not apologize.

 

The Europeans might want to rethink the entire oppressed-Palestinian meme right about now. Israel no longer occupies Gaza, and yet the terrorism there continues to grow unabated. Now the people who they insist want nothing but peace have warned that they will kidnap Europeans until they foreswear freedom of speech.

Perhaps the Europeans could ask the Palestinians about their own issues with cartoons. For instance, if they find this offensive --

-- then maybe they can explain this, which appeared in the Palestinian newspaper Al-Hayat Al-Jadida on March 22, 2000:

Pope: "Peace on Earth!" Satan/Jew: "Colonies on Earth!"

And if they consider this insulting to their honor --

-- then they can explain why the same paper published this in December 1999:

Old man: "20th Century" Young man: "21st Century" Above dwarf Jew: "Disease of the Century"

Those who protest the entire idea of satire and derision should not themselves indulge in it. Their actions reveal themselves as the terrorist thugs that they have always been.

And I note, as does Michelle Malkin and Judith Klinghoffer, that none of the major American media outlets have bothered to display these controversial cartoons. So much for the protectors of free speech and the people's right to know.