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Rantings of a Sandmonkey

Be forewarned: The writer of this blog is an extremely cynical, snarky, pro-US, secular, libertarian, disgruntled sandmonkey. If this is your cup of tea, please enjoy your stay here. If not, please sod off

Friday, February 03, 2006

We are choosing our battles I guess

As expected, no one started a boycott France and Germany campaign. And when I mention it to people, they mumble uncomfortably and then change the subject. Guess it's easy to show off your islamic economic might against the makers of Lego and Butter. But Boycott Channel, Cartier, Rolex, Mercedes or BMW? We don't love the Prophet THAT much. At least the palestinians in the West Bank are keeping it real. Check it out: Early Friday, Palestinian militants threw a bomb at a French cultural center in Gaza City, and many Palestinians began boycotting European goods, especially those from Denmark.

"Whoever defames our prophet should be executed," said Ismail Hassan, 37, a tailor who marched through the pouring rain along with hundreds of others in the West Bank city of Ramallah.

"Bin Laden our beloved, Denmark must be blown up," protesters in Ramallah chanted.

In mosques throughout Palestinian cities, clerics condemned the cartoons. An imam at the Omari Mosque in Gaza City told 9,000 worshippers that those behind the drawings should have their heads cut off.

"If they want a war of religions, we are ready," Hassan Sharaf, an imam in Nablus, said in his sermon.

Fantastic.

About 10,000 demonstrators, including gunmen from the Islamic militant group Hamas firing in the air, marched through Gaza City to the Palestinian legislature, where they climbed on the roof, waving green Hamas banners.

"We are ready to redeem you with our souls and our blood our beloved prophet," they chanted. "Down, Down Denmark."

Thousands of protesters in the center of Nablus burned at least 10 Danish flags. In Jenin, about 1,500 people demonstrated, burning Danish dairy products. Hundreds protested in Jericho, and protests were held in towns throughout Gaza.

Note the absense of French, german, swiss, italian, spanish, and dutch products at their bonefire. In Egypt we have a saying that describes this condition: " He who can't beat up the donkey, beats up the saddle!". It's easy to muscleflex against poor little denmark and their dairy products I guess.

Fearing an outbreak of violence, Israel barred all Palestinians under age 45 from praying at Jerusalem's Al Aqsa Mosque compound, Islam's third holiest site.

Nevertheless, about 100 men chanting Islamic slogans and carrying a green Hamas flag demonstrated outside Jerusalem's Old City on Friday afternoon. The crowd scattered when police on horseback arrived, and some of the protesters threw rocks. Police broke up a second demonstration at Damascus Gate with tear gas and stun grenades.

Not only them, the Indonesians as well: Hardline Indonesian Muslims have stormed into an office block housing the Danish embassy, protesting cartoons portraying the Prophet Mohammad published in Denmark, as others demanded death for the cartoonist. About 100 members of the Front of the Defenders of Islam (FPI) massed outside the building, chanting: "Let's go jihad! We're ready for jihad!". One of their banners said: "Let's slaughter the Danish ambassador!"

The group, mostly wearing their trademark white uniforms with skullcaps, broke through security to enter the building's lobby, where they smashed lamps and threw eggs, but were quickly ejected by police and their own leaders.

Several then pelted the embassy's external coat of arms with eggs.

Maksuni, the leader of the protestors, said ambassador Niels Andersen met with three representatives of the group and promised to issue an apology to the media in Indonesia, the world's largest Islamic country.

"The ambassador has agreed to apologise in the local electronic and print media in one or two days, after they have prepared a draft and they will translate it," he said.

"If they don't apologise as they promised we will kick them out of the country, and we will ask the government to withdraw its ambassador from Denmark," he added.

Ok, I have a question: Isn't having a banner that says "let's slaughter the Danish Ambassador" considerd to be a threat on the life of the danish ambassador? Aren't there, I don't know, laws in Indonesia against that sort of thing? Maybe not. Anyway... Keeping the best for last, I found that Qaradawi agrees with me in my call to boycott the rest of europe as well. Sweet:

The Doha-based Egyptian cleric Yousef al-Qardawi unleashed his anger against Europeans who stood by newspapers which published the cartoons in defence of the freedom of expression.

"If Europe stands behind those (offenders), we all will unite against them," said Qaradawi, who is considered a pan-Islamic preacher.

"We say to the Europeans: We can live without you but you cannot live without us ... We can buy our goods from China, Taiwan, Malaysia and the rest of Asia," he added, in reference to the boycott campaign.

He urged worshippers to boycott the goods of the countries of newspapers which published the cartoons claiming that "every penny or dinar paid would go to these newspapers and be transformed into words or drawings mocking your religion and the Prophet."

Good. I agree with you mr. Qardawi, 100"%. I am sure your love for the Prophet knows no bounds, to the degree that you will set an example for the rest of the muslim nation by abandoning your Mercedes, right? You practice what you preach, right? Good, boycott Mercedes. Boycott BMW. Go for it. Start it, and I am right behind you. I swear.

Sigh...

14 Comments:

At 2/03/2006 11:47:00 AM, Blogger Rancher said...

What hurts Islam more, a few irreverent cartoons or Islamists cutting off the heads of Christian schoolgirls in Indonesia? Warning that link has a very graphic picture that is truly offensive, but illustrates the point that you have to give other religions respect in order to get it. Hamas can occupy and desecrated the Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem and win elections. But let word get out that a Koran has been flushed and out comes the Muslim street’s outrage.

 
At 2/03/2006 12:10:00 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I have paid my twopence at the supermarket today: Lupark, butter-cookies, Carlsberg. Not much for Denmark, but it made me feel much better.

 
At 2/03/2006 12:45:00 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Monkey, so you think you are smart ha!

If you had followed up the news carefully you would have noticed that the Muslims did not call for boycott on Norway although this country was the second in publishing the cartoons.
Habibi, the issue is not only the publication of the cartoons; it is also the ignorance of the Denmark prime Minster, after the publication, of the Arab ambassadors.

It is pathetic how some people think that they are so smart because they ONLY don’t react like the general public!

You might be inspired if you hear the opinion of Jack Straw about the freedom of expersison!

 
At 2/03/2006 01:06:00 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Blower,
I guess carrying signs that advocate the murder of others is good freedom of expression, yes?
You don't seem to understand the concept that SM and others have been trying to discribe. That is that every time people of the Islamic faith respond to a situation with insane violence against innocents (head chopping Christian school girls comes to mind) the rest of the world thinks all followers of Islam are insanly violent. It really is very simple. Threatening to murder (slaughter) the Danish Ambassador to Indonesia is insane. Are you insane? Even the editor of the Jordanian newspaper tried to say this. He was fired for his efforts.

 
At 2/03/2006 01:19:00 PM, Blogger The Sandmonkey said...

Blower,

Monkey, so you think you are smart ha!

As a matter of fact, yes, yes I do. I think i am a genius, especially compared to you. :)

If you had followed up the news carefully you would have noticed that the Muslims did not call for boycott on Norway although this country was the second in publishing the cartoons.

Yeah, I wonder why that is? Isn;t thins about how it's offensive to show the face of the prophet or depicting in a certain way? Isn't the aim of this boycott to make sure that such cartoons are never permitted to be printed in any country ever again? Why isn't Norway, and everyone else, included as well in that boycott?

Well, maybe because not mnay people knew about the Norway thing to start with. Maybe because Norway's leftwing government was quickly to apologize for the cartoon because it didn't want any trouble. Or maybe because we really don't know what Norway produces. Who knows?

Habibi, the issue is not only the publication of the cartoons; it is also the ignorance of the Denmark prime Minster, after the publication, of the Arab ambassadors.

Weird, I really thought it was about the publication of thsoe cartoons. My bad. Did anyone tell all of thsoe people who are going crazy that it isn't about the publication of the cartoons? Oh, wait, you said it's not only about that. My bad.

Ok, so it was that and the fact that the danish prime minister ignored our arab ambassadors. Hmm. I wonder why that is. Let's imagine the situation shall we. The Prime minister of Denmark sitting in his office, and he hears that a group of arab ambassadors are really angry about a cartoon published in an independet newspaper, and they want to meet him so he can "do something about it". I can just see the whole thing.

PM: They want to meet me, because they are angry over a cartoon? What? They want me to apologize to them, because of a cartoon that a newspaper published? For real? Don't those people have any other pressing issues to discuss? No? Ok, well, I do. I probably have better things to do then to explain to people what Freedom of the press means, let alone even talk about a cartoon. Tell them I am busy.

Yeah, I am sure it went something like that.

Now, in hindsght, he maybe should've met our ambassadors and talked about the pressing cartoon issue, but, seriously, how would he have known that we are the kind of people who would lose it over a cartoon?

Hmm....

 
At 2/03/2006 01:26:00 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Sandy
Qaradawi had 2 daughters living in the UK, either they are still there or left i am not sure, he had a son studying engineering in the US & there he was spewing venom to Boycot america yet he didnt seem to boycot any Dollars, so he wants now to stand up to Europe with what may i ask? he will have to change his account in Euros or he can easily squeeze a fatwa that permits him to keep euros as long as he preaches against europe.
If muslims proved anything by these wild rabid behaviour is that they still have centuries to grow up & mature to catch up with the world...its shameful to say the least.

 
At 2/03/2006 01:32:00 PM, Blogger The Sphinx said...

You might be inspired if you hear the opinion of Jack Straw about the freedom of expersison!

Yeah I saw that. Was quite interesting ;-) It seemed as if he really didn't rehearse that speech at all..

 
At 2/03/2006 03:27:00 PM, Blogger Rancher said...

Llano Estacado TrackBack Cartoon Chaos

 
At 2/03/2006 07:03:00 PM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

@Blower
> You might be inspired if you hear the opinion of Jack Straw about the freedom of expersison!

I'll be much more inspired by what he says when british papers start printing them too.

 
At 2/04/2006 12:04:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I don't think the(and I hope) American and British newspapers will publish the cartoons. As far as I know, the people and the media in UK and the USA are wiser and more experience than others in understanding how freedom of experssion should be used!

As there is a concept of the 'right' in the law, there is another concept which is the abuse of the right.

At 1:06 PM, Anonymous said...
Blower,
I guess carrying signs that advocate the murder of others is good freedom of expression, yes?


Did I say that?!

 
At 2/04/2006 01:34:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

"You might be inspired if you hear the opinion of Jack Straw about the freedom of expersison!"____Jack Straw is a slimy prig. I would take no notice at all of what he says about anything.

 
At 2/04/2006 01:42:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

I'm kind of wondering why the US media have not published the cartoons.Could it be because 95% of Americans could care less about this,if in fact they've even heard about it? And trust me,the majority would fail to see why some muslims are reacting so strongly to some silly drawings!!! Perhaps Americans should attack the Indonesian embassy in Washington (if there is one) to protest the beheadings of Christian schoolgirls.

 
At 2/04/2006 02:32:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

"It's easy to muscleflex against poor little denmark and their dairy products I guess."

Maybe I misunderstood this but... we aren't poor, we're extremely rich. We're one of the richest countries in the world. It's too bad for Arla though, they're hurting right now, but they're not going outta business you know. This boycott won't have that big an impact on our economy as some might think. Out of an export of 450 billion danish kr, we export for about... hmm I'd recon at most 15 billion danish kr. to the muslim countries. This boycott is unfortunate, but we'll cope just fine.

 
At 2/04/2006 02:52:00 AM, Anonymous Anonymous said...

Here is some important background information on this cartoon campaign.

 

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