UK Islamic group condemns website with cartoons of Prophet

[DJKeefy]

UK Islamic group condemns website featuring cartoons of Prophet Mohamed and Jesus.

One of the most influential Islamic organisations in the UK has slammed a website that publishes cartoons featuring Prophet Mohamed and Jesus.

The website, Jesus and Mo http://www.jesusandmo.net/ features a weekly comic strip in which the two prophets debate and joke about the central tenets of Islam and Christianity.

The Muslim Association of Britain (MAB) published a statement saying that the images were "extremely offensive to believers" of the two faiths and "potentially inflammatory," and urged the website's operators to take down the comics at once.

The MAB added that the depiction of the two prophets was “as insulting as those published in Denmark," referring to the 12 editorial cartoons depicting Prophet Mohamed that were printed in a Danish newspaper in 2005, sparking widespread anger and protests.

Insisting that it respects freedom of speech and artistic expression, the MAB however questioned "the wisdom of any individual or organization that places at risk the dignity and values of anyone else, even if they might not hold those values."

The site's most-recent comic, from 15 January, shows Prophet Mohamed and Jesus in bed together, with Prophet Mohamed reading the Bible and grilling Jesus over the believability of the resurrection.

The website's operators have refused to remove the cartoons.

The UK Islamic group also attacked British politician Maajid Naawaz for posting the cartoons to his Twitter account.

Naawaz, a Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate in the Hampstead and Kilburn constituency in Greater London, is aiming to be the party's first Muslim member of UK Parliament.

In response to Naawaz posting the cartoons, the MAB called on the Lib Dem party to drop him as a candidate, and urged Muslims in his constituency not to vote for him.

Formerly a member of Hizb ut-Tahrir, an Islamic group with aims of establishing a global caliphate and Sharia law, Nawaz has since broken with the group and made a name for himself as a progressive Muslim. In 2008 he co-founded the Quilliam Foundation, an anti-extremism think tank advocating pluralism and cross-cultural acceptance between Muslims and other faiths.

Ahram Online was unable to reach Nawaz for comment.

However, in response to the outcry, Nawaz defended the cartoon on his Facebook page, saying that it was not offensive.

"Even if it was," Nawaz said, "I'm sure God is greater than to feel threatened by it."

Source: http://english.ahram.org.eg/News/92083.aspx

[Brian Yare]

I don't see the problem. These guys are only prophets. It is not as if they are God!

[Bearded Brian]

Ah but the better one was at least a son of a god. But a prophet is a profit in any country.

[DJKeefy]

Bless him... at least he tried

[Dusak]

Do you think anyone will profit from this silly argument?

[Jayway]

No. but someone may die -

[Hafiz]

I've thought that some of these things, like cartoons, (strangely familiar to an event some years ago in Denmark (?)) are calculated to produce a specific response that portrays Islam negatively. For example, the mad Florida preacher who burnt the Koran in front of TV cameras. He got publicity beyond his dreams as well as a fatwa that further added to his 'prestige'.

The Dutch politician Wilders, he of the immaculately coiffed white hair and a strong sense of self dramatics, who did something to warrant a fatwa, visited Australia in the past year. Travel to the UK is not possible for him because he is banned for hate speech.

He appeared to enjoy the notoriety, drew attention to the police guard and does saturation interviews wherever he goes. In fact he seemed very well pleased with himself. His policy to de-Islamicize the Netherlands and the resulting fatwa was a great way of building his case that Muslims were dangerous and against free speech.

I've often wondered whether certain groups do or say things that deliberately provoke an extreme Muslim. In the case of Wilders his interviews use the fatwa and police guard to prove his point that Muslims should be got out of the Netherlands. Meanwhile he enjoys a world wide celebrity that his minor opposition party could not buy but would wish for. You can say the fatwa made him.

In the case of the aspiring member for Kilburn and Hampstead, anti Muslim cartoons and an appeal to free speech should go down very well in this upper middle class and over educated white/Jewish electorate. On the other hand, removing the screen saver would not appeal to the civil rights brigade whom he hopes will elect him to this most salubrious of suburbs.

I'm not in favor of fatwa's but equally I'm not in favor of deliberate and calculated provocations. Think what would happen in Northern Island if free speech ran riot and Catholic priests were denouncing the other side. We expect that in such circumstances of religious tension (think also of the former Yugoslavia or denunciations of Hinduism in India) there should be restraint: that is unless you hope to benefit from lack of restraint.

In this case the UK cartoon this seems a copy cat of the European one quite a few years ago. Maybe provocateurs aren't very imaginative or maybe they know, from previous experience, how it will play out.