An update to this story. "Two dead in Pakistan rioting," from AP, with thanks to Jeffrey Imm:
LAHORE, Pakistan (AP) -- More than 1,000 protesters stormed into Islamabad's diplomatic district while thousands vandalized Western businesses and torched a government building in another city Tuesday, in Pakistan's worst wave of violence against the Prophet Mohammed cartoons, officials said.At least two people were killed.
Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao said two protesters died in the worst of the violence in the eastern city of Lahore, when a bank security guard opened fire to prevent demonstrators from forcing their way into a bank.
He said paramilitary troops were deployed in the city to restore order, after stone-throwing protesters ran amok.
Witnesses said rioters torched the provincial assembly building and targeted Western businesses, breaking windows at a Holiday Inn hotel and Pizza Hut, KFC and McDonald's restaurants.
They also damaged more than 200 cars, two banks, dozens of shops and a large portrait of President Gen. Pervez Musharraf, witnesses said.
The protesters also looted the office of Telenor, a Norwegian mobile phone company, and people ran away with computers, mobile phones and other equipment, witnesses said....
The students had earlier marched to several universities in Peshawar and hurled stones at a Christian school, breaking windows and causing other damage. They also threw stones at shops in the city's main business district, chanting "Down with America" and "Down with Denmark."
President Gen. Pervez Musharraf told journalists in the capital Islamabad on Monday that newspapers that have printed the caricatures were "being totally oblivious to the consequences for the world, for world peace and harmony."
Come on, Musharraf. Why don't you have the guts to say that the protestors are mad, utterly mad, and that it is insane to get so worked up about a few cartoons, and that they have shamed Pakistan before the world?
"The most moderate Muslim will go to the street and talk against it because this hurts the sentiments of every Muslim," he said. "Whether an extremist or a moderate or an ultra moderate, we will condemn it."...
Fine. Condemn it all day. There are plenty of things printed in newspapers every day that I condemn. But I'm not killing anybody over it.
CNN is not showing the negative caricatures of the likeness of the Prophet Mohammed because the network believes its role is to cover the events surrounding the publication of the cartoons while not unnecessarily adding fuel to the controversy itself.
And also, CNN added under its breath, we don't want to get killed, and we value our sorry lives more than the freedoms for which our forefathers fought and died.
..."protesters also looted the office of Telenor, a Norwegian mobile phone company, and people ran away with computers, mobile phones and other equipment, witnesses said...."
Its all about booty, you see!
Has nothing to do with Islam or Jihad, its simply poor and oppressed muslims revolting against poverty! Just give them money and put on another one of these live-aid concerts and we'll all just get along, peace! Harmony! Flower power!
Thank goodness these rioting students were moderate muslims. Hate to see what the bad muslims might have done if they rioted.
This whole thing is starting to remind me of that little ditty by "Nena", "Ninety-Nine Red Balloons". If I were to write a song about this situation, I'd call it "Just a Dozen Dumb Cartoons."
Interior Minister Aftab Khan Sherpao said two protesters died in the worst of the violence in the eastern city of Lahore, when a bank security guard opened fire to prevent demonstrators from forcing their way into a bank.
++++Poor things didn't get to rob the bank. Awww This story proves that cartoon outrage is just an excuse for people to vent violently and steal what ever they can get their thieving hands on.
O the brave Fifth estate.
CNN and the NYTimes = cowards masquerading as "sensitive" people.
Live free or die, you dishonest fools.
Only two?
Savages!
"CNN is not showing the negative caricatures of the likeness of the Prophet Mohammed because the network believes its role is to cover the events surrounding the publication of the cartoons while not unnecessarily adding fuel to the controversy itself."
Unforgivable. No wonder I never watch CNN. I'm always looking for the whole story.
The two dead protesters probably got trmapled to death by their fellow rioters. Too bad it couldn't have been more. Sorry, John Donne, but Solomon's proverbial time for anger has come.
Publish a few cartoons and watch muslims kill each other and burn their own communities !
I love it !!! Publish some more...........
Close your eyes and imagine the 3 stooges multiplied by the thousands with sticks and stones. Two fingers right in the eyes Abu! A purple nurple for you Ali! Look! What's that behind you Hakeem! What a bunch of Knuckle heads. I would slink away and find a cave to crawl in (no pun intended) if the men in my culter/country behaved like this.
"Only two?" Posted by: JanuaryMan
LOL.
I was going to post that exactly after reading the article, only to see that we had the exact same thought.
-Cheers
Reminds me of the Watts Riots and after the Rodney King trials....Burn down your own neighborhoods and family businesses...Really intelligent. Don't know about the Holiday Inn but the food establishments are franchises owned by locals....Maybe they just wanted the crispy version of Pizza Hut and well done burgers at Burger King? What a bunch of neanderthals.
I'm not particularly interested in insulting anyone, Moslems included. For me it's a matter of good manners and I am content to keep my opinions to myself, this blog site excepted. :) But in my opinion, nobody has a right to cut off anyone's head for an insult, for crying out loud. Good manners must take a back seat to common sense in this case.
Now the public is treated to more calls for understanding between the communities. I am all for genuine understanding. I for one would like to know how one goes from being offended over a cartoon to issuing death threats and rioting in the streets. I would like to know why free speech is such a threat to people not only living in the third world, but to those now living in the West who still find themselves foaming at the mouth and glowering over cartoons depicting their prophet, well, foaming at the mouth and glowering.
I would also like to understand why CNN, BBC and other news services don't publish the cartoons. If pictures of "art works" lampooning Jesus or the Virgin Mary have been published by these services, then clearly the precedent has been set. If so, then perhaps the news services would kindly explain the break with precedence that dissuades them from covering this story in like manner. The major news services should help their viewers understand what the rage is based upon, what all the fuss is about.
Put the question to the people involved: What is the full extent of the problem? Are the cartoons inaccurate? Are they defamatory? If so, then let the discussion, perhaps impassioned but civilized and controlled, begin. Or, if the case can be made, let legal precedent be set in a court of secular law; a precedent that will protect the rights of all citizens irrespective of religious persuasion.
But threats? Riots? That's taking the law into one's own hands and is unacceptable on that basis alone. But is is also blasphemously disproportionate to the purported offense.
http://news.yahoo.com/photos/ss/events/wl/020106danishcartoons;_ylt=AoXCp5gLXEYJwVsb_PCUE7BpaP0E;_ylu=X3oDMTA4OHR0b3NtBHNlYwNpeG12
All this peace and love coming soon to a town near you thanks to the religion of anarchy. No thanks Naseem.
What was it a couple months ago, mates?
The Counsel of American islamic relationships was calling this a hate site?
What do they have to say to everyone now?
That this is a bloody mirage we're seeing?
Muslims are whacko
Siniliano, let's hope that if the businesses were insured, they were insured by a French firm.
Would serve them right.
The Muslim Kristalnacht is underway!!
If they ever try that on MY street, they will be in for a big surprise.
Siciliano, sorry about the typo.
And dont forget, oh faithful muslims, in all your getting, get all you can. Loot is so good, that Mohammad had fits when he did not have enough. The good thing about 'loot' is that you can always loot more. Soon, you loose your loot supply, as you have robbed everyone in sight, so you have to expand your horizons. Raiding villages as you go is a good way, when you reach the border, keep going. There's more loot, and it is getting better and better.
007.003 “Follow the Revelation given to you from your Lord and follow not as protectors other than Him. Little do you remember My warning. How many towns have We destroyed as a raid by night? Our punishment took them suddenly while they slept for their afternoon rest. Our terror came to them; Our punishment overtook them. No cry did they utter but: ‘We were wrong-doers.’”
And dont forget the loot...and slave girls...
I expected all US media to feel free to publicize the photos because it is newsworthy. How do you have thousands of individuals protesting all over the globe and not show them why. I do understand the Christian Science Monitor keeping a low profile, however.
I'm glad that Ronald McDonald took out two of them before his own demise.
I don't understand the clamoring for the US print media to print these cartoons nor how anyone in the US can express surprise that the US media would be reluctant to print these cartoons based on some out-dated notion of "freedom of the press". We have not had "freedom of the press" here in the US for 40 years. Want proof? Just try to print a caricature of a black person in a derogatory manner. If a newspaper syndicate printed a picture of a black person in a stereotypical manner with big lips or nose or in a pose of eating chicken or watermelon, half the cities in the US would be burned down, Jesse Jackson would be demanding "compensation" and the cartoonist would be charged with a "hate crime". Oh, but it's OK to depict white people any way you want. They don't burn and loot when they don't get their way. Our "freedom of the press" in the US has been held hostage by racial blackmail for 40 years, so why would you be surprised that it couldn't be held hostage by religious blackmail? It's perfectly OK to offend Christians, but God forbid that Muslims be offended. The groups that destroy, kill, burn and loot seem to be able to have what they want because of their lawlessness. That's a surprise?
Islam is a regular riot!
Or is this Muslims' idea of reading westerners the "riot act"?
CNN and the rest of the MSM preach freedom of speech and freedom of the press, but let threats come their way and they become silent and cowards and go into hiding.
This is indicative of the elitists and the liberal left who will scream and rant about every little thing done or imagined done by the right and Christians and gun owners and straights and all non-liberals, but will not stand up and fight for their own freedoms that they scream about being impinged on by all of the non-liberals.
One plus one does not equal two when a liberal is threatened.
Where are the embedded reporters when you need them to express the truth??????
When the war with Islam starts, the liberals will hide and expect everyone to protect them because the MSM has to be saved so it can report on all that is happening. Sobs.
The Texican,
Be prepared, be armed, be ready.
Freedom. The only choice at any price.