Words of peace and tolerance from a Muslim cleric in Pakistan on the Day of Rage.
Why crucified? Because it’s in the Qur’an, of course — immediately following the oft-quoted verse about how killing an innocent person is like killing the whole world. That’s Qur’an 5:32. 5:33 says: “The punishment of those who wage war against Allah and His Messenger, and strive with might and main for mischief through the land is: execution, or crucifixion, or the cutting off of hands and feet from opposite sides, or exile from the land: that is their disgrace in this world, and a heavy punishment is theirs in the Hereafter.”
“Pakistanis protest, cleric says Pope should be crucified,” from AFP, with thanks to all who sent this in:
ISLAMABAD (AFP) – Hundreds of Pakistani Islamists held street protests to condemn Pope Benedict XVI for remarks they regard as anti-Islamic, with one leader saying the pontiff should be crucified.
Demonstrators Friday poured out of mosques after the main weekly Muslim prayers in Pakistan’s largest city Karachi, the eastern city of Lahore, the capital Islamabad and other urban centres.
“If the pope comes here we will hang him on the Cross,” Hafiz Hussain Ahmed, a senior leader of Pakistan’s main alliance of radical parties, told around 200 noisy demonstrators in Islamabad.
The alliance, called the Muttahida Majlis-e-Amal or United Action Front, forms part of the parliamentary opposition and is often heavily involved in street protests in mostly Muslim Pakistan.
Ahmed also said the pope had joined US President George W. Bush’s “crusade” against Muslims, referring to Christians who fought against Muslims from the 11th through the 13th centuries.