Tribute

A salute to the Danish fighting men in Iraq and Afghanistan who paid the highest price to protect our freedom:

Why the Motoons

Very good interview of Flemming Rose, the Danish editor who published the Motoons. In it, he explains the idea behind them and how the unrest that followed has changed the way we discuss Islam.

Its well worth ten minutes of your time.



(Hat tip: Idioten.)

Stop the clocks, She is dead!!

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message She Is Dead,
Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,
Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

She was my North, my South, my East and West,
My working week and my Sunday rest,
My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;
I thought that love would last for ever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now: put out every one;
Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun;
Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.
For nothing now can ever come to any good.

Helle - my love, my life, my hope - farewell.
One day we shall be together again.
I yearn for that day.

May you rest in peace.

MidEast terror-threats against Danish Election

Denmark is in the middle of an parliamentary election, and one of the parties, the outspoken anti-salafist Dansk Folkeparti (Danish Peoples Party or DPP) produced an ad in the beginning of the campaign:


Text reads: Freedom of speech is Danish,
censorship is not


Gates of Vienna covered it pretty well when the ad first appeared.
It is of course a reference to the Motoon-crisis Denmark went through last year. The drawing originates from a 400 year old translation of the Koran and you would think an old sketch like that would be incapable of hurting anyones feelings.

Never the less, the thought of someone picturing their precious prophet pisses your average Terrorist Joe off big time. So now the Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades in Palestine, a group responsible for numerous suicide-attacks and assassinations on Israeli civilians, are threatening Denmark with retaliation.

This from the daily Jyllands-Posten: (link in Danish, my translation)

The Palestinian terror organization al-Aqsa Martyr Brigade is now directly warning DPP:
"This party is dealing with the blood of the Danish population," says a spokesman for al-Aqsa Martyrs Brigade Khaled al-Jabbari who brings up the subject at an interview with Jyllands-Posten in Gaza

Is that a threat?
"No, it's not threat, it's warning. We do not want to see the Danish people as enemies, but this could push towards actions," he says and announces that he himself is ready to participate actively in actions against Danish institutions to defend the Prophet.

I'm not quite sure what "institutions" Mr. al-Jabbari is referring to. Surely he can't be talking about the Danish Foreign Ministry that has forked out 31 million US dollars of taxpayers money in less than ten years to the poor Palestinians.

But back to the story:

"I have heard that a Danish party is using the Mohammad drawings in its campaign and I have a message to the Danish people that this is the same as stabbing us in our hearts. They (the DPP) must be living on the moon to do something like this, for it is very insulting and not acceptable."

He warns that the brigade will put the DPP on it's list of enemies.

"They will not only be the enemy of the al-Aqsa Brigade, but to many Muslims," he says.

Needles to say, the leader of the DPP, Pia Kjærsgaard is outraged:

This is utterly insane, and we will under no circumstances bend to a terrorist organization. It is not us who have made the drawing, it's a 400 year old drawing of Mohammad that we use as a symbol of freedom of speech," she says.

Prime minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen (Liberal Party - liberal in the European sense of the word that is) is also outraged:

"It is of course completely unacceptable that a terror organization such as the al-Aqsa Brigade is attempting to intimidate Danish democracy," says Fogh and underlines that "we will in no way give in to that kind of pressure and influence from the outside."

Danish security police have heightened the overall protection of the campaigning politicians after the "warning" from al-Aqsa.

Funny thing though. Nowhere is it stated in the ad that it's Mo who is pictured. It could be Sheik Yerbouti for all al-Jabba the Hut knows.




Update: Exile is also on the case. Go read him, he's got some good comments on this affair.