‘Descendants of Mohammed’ Confront Newspapers Over Cartoons, Demanding Apologies and Eyeing Lawsuits

A Western  government that allows these frivolous lawsuits to go ahead is complicit in aiding and abetting the enemy and in the destruction of our free society.

Update: Andrew Gilligan knows how the Islamo-fascists play their dirty little game:  “We need to ensure Channel 4 receives a strong message from the community by being inundated with complaints,” says the email. That was nearly a week before transmission.  Islamist radicals: Complain early, complain often…/Telegraph/UK

A woman reads the Koran in the Omayyad mosque in Damascus ahead of a holiday on Feb. 26, 2010 marking the birthday of Mohammed, the revered 7th century prophet of Islam. (AP Photo/Ola Rifai)

(CNSNews.com) – After securing an apology from one Danish newspaper for publishing a cartoon satirizing Mohammed, a Saudi lawyer now plans to confront another 15 newspapers, filing lawsuits against them if necessary.

Faisal Yamani says he is acting on behalf of eight Muslim organizations representing “descendants of Mohammed.”

He told the Danish tabloid B.T. that he has 15 newspapers in his sights. His clients have made it clear they are ready to finance a campaign of lawsuits if the papers refuse to follow the example of the liberal daily Politiken and apologize. Yamani did not say how much he would aim to extract from the media organizations but referred to “a long and very expensive legal action.”

Cartoon-mania…

On Friday, Politiken published a formal apology to “anyone who was offended” by its decision to reproduce one of the 12 cartoons which triggered an international furor after another Danish paper, Jyllands-Posten, first published them in September 2005.

Politiken editor Toeger Seidenfaden said his paper had not published the sketch “as a statement of editorial opinion or values but merely as part of the newspaper’s news coverage.”

“It was never Politiken’s intention to offend Muslims in Denmark or elsewhere.”

In a joint statement with Yamani, the newspaper said that the Saudi lawyer’s clients had as a result of the apology now agreed “not to pursue any legal or administrative action against Politiken.”

The cartoon printed by Politiken was the one depicting a man wearing a turban shaped like a bomb with its fuse lit, drawn by cartoonist Kurt Westergaard.

Among the others, submitted by various artists, one showed “Mohammed” with eyes blacked out and carrying a large, curved knife, flanked by two burqa-clad women, while another depicted him telling a line of suicide bombers seeking entry to paradise: “Stop, stop, we have run out of virgins.” A more benign interpretation portrayed a man in white with a beard, a stick and a donkey.

The original appearance of the cartoons drew scant attention but after Danish Muslim clerics toured the Arab world to drum up reaction, protests erupted.

Muslims consider any images of the 7th century founder of their religion to be blasphemous. The association with terrorism and extremism further fueled the anger.

Protests were held in many Muslim nations, and in Nigeria, Libya and Afghanistan they turned deadly. Danish goods were boycotted in some Mideast countries, and the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) used the issue to escalate its campaign at the United Nations aimed at outlawing the “defamation” of Islam.

Over time the protests ebbed, but after a plot was uncovered in 2008 to murder Westergaard, the turban cartoon was reprinted widely again in a show of solidarity. It was at this time that Politiken published it.

Its decision now to offer an apology drew strong criticism in Denmark, with Prime Minister Loekke Rasmussen saying he was troubled by the breaking of ranks.

“If this is an expression of breaking the unity that has existed among Danish newspapers and in Danish society, it is a matter of serious, serious concern,” he said. “If this is a question of bowing to a threat in order to avoid a court case, I am also concerned.”

Foreign Minister Lene Espersen said Danish newspapers should “stick together when they are met with threats.”

Westergaard was quoted as saying the decision amounted to giving in to the fear of terror, and Jyllands-Posten editor Jorn Mikkelsen, said it marked a “sad day for Danish media, for freedom of speech and for Politiken.”

Yamani, who is a partner in the Jeddah-based law firm Ahmed Zaki Yamani, approached 11 Danish newspapers several months ago on behalf of his clients. No other paper has yet publicly agreed to the proposed apology agreement.

Yamani claims to be representing eight organizations, based in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Libya, Qatar, Jordan, Australia and the Palestinian self-rule territories. He says they comprise 94,923 descendants of Mohammed.

The main client is the Cairo-based Union of Al-Ashraf (Niqabat al Ashraf), which says it has more than 80,000 registered members. Ashraf (plural of Sharifs) are Muslims claiming direct lineage to Mohammed via Fatima, the daughter from the first of his multiple marriages.

Queries sent to the organization’s president, Mahmoud el-Sharif, brought no response.

Mohammedan grievance theater designed to intimidate:

‘Deeply hurt’

In a statement reacting to the apology by Politiken, an OIC spokesman said 1.5 billion Muslims had “felt humiliated, insulted and deeply hurt by the publication of the cartoons.” The organization hoped the apology would be replicated by other newspapers involved and by the cartoonists

(The OIC spokesman does not speak for 1.5 billion muslims. He assumes and claims he does. Besides, Muslims have no right not to be  humiliated, insulted or deeply hurt for worshipping a pedophile warlord./ed)

He said the OIC was “strongly committed to freedom of expression but believes that it should be exercised responsibly so as not to create incitement and provocation leading to social unrest and disturb interfaith harmony.” (He is a liar. The OIC is determined to destroy freedom of expression…/ed)

Writing on a Web site of Britain’s Daily Telegraph, Douglas Murray, the director of the Centre for Social Cohesion – a think tank focusing on extremism in Britain – said the apology “epitomizes one of the most aggravating trends currently being accepted, which is the notion that Muslims somehow have deeper feelings than the rest of the world.”

“Most of us regularly have our deepest feelings trodden upon, not least by the expressions of bigoted Muslim attitudes,” he wrote. “But we don’t burn things, we don’t intimidate people, and we don’t force apologies out of newspapers for offence caused. Because we recognize that being offended is part of being a grown up in a free society.

“The sooner more Muslims learn that the better.”

STFU, Muslims!

Meet Brother Fareed, Obama’s Cartoon Czar

Thanks to Weasel:

No, not shocked….

NEW HAVEN, Conn. — Yale University has removed cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad from an upcoming book about how they caused outrage across the Muslim world, drawing criticism from prominent alumni and a national group of university professors.

Yale University Press, which the university owns, removed the 12 caricatures from the book “The Cartoons That Shook the World” by Brandeis University professor Jytte Klausen. The book is scheduled to be released next week.

“I think it’s horrifying that the campus of Nathan Hale has become the first place where America surrenders to this kind of fear because of what extremists might possibly do,” said Michael Steinberg, an attorney and Yale graduate.

Steinberg was among 25 alumni who signed a protest letter sent Friday to Yale Alumni Magazine that urged the university to restore the drawings to the book. Other signers included John Bolton, a former U.S. ambassador to the United Nations under President George W. Bush, former Bush administration speechwriter David Frum and Seth Corey, a liberal doctor.

“I think it’s intellectual cowardice,” Bolton said Thursday. “I think it’s very self defeating on Yale’s part. To me it’s just inexplicable.”

Fareed Zakaria, editor of Newsweek International, a world affairs columnist and CNN host who serves on Yale’s governing board, said he told Yale that he believed publishing the images would have provoked violence. (can’t have violence unless its Islamic, then its okay…/ed)

“As a journalist and public commentator, I believe deeply in the First Amendment and academic freedom,” Zakaria said. “But in this instance Yale Press was confronted with a clear threat of violence and loss of life.” (Fareed Zakaria is the son of an Islamic scholar and as such an agent for Islamic causes in the US of A. Of course he doesn’t believe in the first amendment, but lying is an art-form in Islam/ed)

Rest here>>>

Stand for free speech

Yale & the Danish Cartoons: The Plot Thickens

Pajamas Media/Andrew Bolt

So why did Yale University refuse to publish not only the Danish cartoons, but famous historial images of Muhammad, even when Muslim scholars gave it the go-ahead?

The suspicion was at first the normal one – that the university was simply too scared to stand up for free speech. ButRoger Kimball digs deeper and smells money….

When the Danish cartoons were first published I was completely delighted, and then was just flummoxed when nearly all of a cowardly free press failed to publish the cartoons in a show of support for a) freedom of speech and expression, and b) support and protect the cartoon authors.

The oil-slick princes  of Arabia must be wondering  if there is anything petrodollars can’t buy in a country whose president bowed to a Moslem king as one of his first acts in office:

Follow the money:

…energetic investigative reporters are looking into Yale’s financial relationships with some of the spots where Linda Lorimer, Vice President and Secretary of the University, told Professor Klausen she has often traveled recently: Saudi Arabia, for example. Quite soon, I suspect, we will know why the Yale administration insisted that the Yale University Press dim the lux and veritas when it came to Professor Klausen’s book.

A book about Mohammed cartoons without the cartoons. What does that make us?

Would it surprise you if  Yale is planning to remove the hebrew lettering from its seal because it could be perceived as offensive?

Dhimmitude at Yale University Press: Muhammad cartoons self-censored from book about Muhammad cartoons

How to strike fear into the heart of Yale University Press

The absurdity of cringing dhimmitude and Fear of Offending Muslims reaches its apotheosis.

“Yale Press Bans Images of Muhammad in New Book,” by Patricia Cohen for the New York Times, August 12 (thanks to Jihad Watch):

It’s not all that surprising that Yale University Press would be wary of reprinting notoriously controversial cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad in a forthcoming book. After all, when the 12 caricatures were first published by a Danish newspaper a few years ago and reprinted by other European publications, Muslims all over the world angrily protested, calling the images — which included one in which Muhammad wore a turban in the shape of a bomb — blasphemous. In the Middle East and Africa some rioted, burning and vandalizing embassies; others demanded a boycott of Danish goods; a few nations recalled their ambassadors from Denmark. In the end at least 200 people were killed.

So Yale University and Yale University Press consulted two dozen authorities, including diplomats and experts on Islam and counterterrorism, and the recommendation was unanimous: The book, “The Cartoons That Shook the World,” should not include the 12 Danish drawings that originally appeared in September 2005. What’s more, they suggested that the Yale press also refrain from publishing any other illustrations of the prophet that were to be included, specifically, a drawing for a children’s book; an Ottoman print; and a sketch by the 19th-century artist Gustave Doré of Muhammad being tormented in Hell, an episode from Dante’s “Inferno” that has been depicted by Botticelli, Blake, Rodin and Dalí.

The book’s author, Jytte Klausen, a Danish-born professor of politics at Brandeis University, in Waltham, Mass., reluctantly accepted Yale University Press’s decision not to publish the cartoons. But she was disturbed by the withdrawal of the other representations of Muhammad. All of those images are widely available, Ms. Klausen said by telephone, adding that “Muslim friends, leaders and activists thought that the incident was misunderstood, so the cartoons needed to be reprinted so we could have a discussion about it.” The book is due out in November.

John Donatich, the director of Yale University Press, said by telephone that the decision was difficult, but the recommendation to withdraw the images, including the historical ones of Muhammad, was “overwhelming and unanimous.” The cartoons are freely available on the Internet and can be accurately described in words, Mr. Donatich said, so reprinting them could be interpreted easily as gratuitous.

He noted that he had been involved in publishing other controversial books — like “The King Never Smiles” by Paul M. Handley, a recent unauthorized biography of Thailand’s current monarch — and “I’ve never blinked.” But, he said, “when it came between that and blood on my hands, there was no question.”

The blood wouldn’t be on your hands, Mr. Donatich. The blood would be on the hands of the murderous fanatical Muslims who might kill because of these cartoons. That would be on their heads, not yours. This is one of our biggest problems: we are letting irrational, bloodthirsty people dictate terms for us, and allowing them to displace their responsibility for their irrational, murderous actions onto us.

Reza Aslan, a religion scholar and the author of “No god but God: The Origins, Evolution, and Future of Islam,” is a fan of the book but decided to withdraw his supportive blurb that was to appear in the book after Yale University Press dropped the pictures. The book is “a definitive account of the entire controversy,” he said, “but to not include the actual cartoons is to me, frankly, idiotic.”…

First time I’ve ever agreed with Reza Aslan, and probably the last.