On 30 September 2005, the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten published a series of illustrations featuring the Prophet Muhammad. They were, according to managing editor of TV2/East Jutland as "part of a news piece on self-censorship."

What was the story? The Danish author of a children's book about the prophet Mohammed could not find an illustrator willing to publicly work on the book.

The newspaper reported the story and "took a position that it is untenable for non-Muslims to be bound by Muslim scripture."

After asking about 40 Danish illustrators to submit art, the paper published 12 illustrations (media-dubbed as "cartoons") on 30 September "as a contribution to the debate about self-censorship amongst journalists, authors, and artists."

The editor comments: "If we want to talk about provocation - which in any circumstances I don't feel it was - then we were provoking the illustrators who didn't dare use their freedom of expression, out of fear of reprisals from extremist Muslims." He continues:

• Some Muslim denominations permit drawings of Mohammed. In some places, like Iran, you can even buy pictures of Mohammed. And then there was the question: "Muslims can't, but what about non-Muslims?"
  
  The [illustration] in which Mohammed has a bomb in his turban has been singled out for particular criticism. But for me, the association is obvious. It's a way of portraying the problem of fanatical, Islam terrorists, who themselves make the connection - between their attacks and the religion itself and its content. That's what our [illustrator] wanted to show. It's a common topic of discussion: "To what extent does Islam in and of itself contribute to the creation of terrorists? Does Islam create its own terrorists?" I think it's a fair question. I never imagined that we would experience the reaction we got.

Death threats have come from Pakistan. Bounties have been offered on the heads of illustrators. Western embassies in Syria, Lebanon, Indonesia and Iran have been attacked - although the numbers protesting are low.

In response, the largest circulation paper in Iran launched a contest "to find the 12 'best' cartoons about the Holocaust."

"The Western papers printed these sacrilegious cartoons on the pretext of freedom of expression, so let?s see if they mean what they say and also print these Holocaust cartoons," said Farid Mortazavi, graphics editor for Tehran's Hamshahri.

According to the Times [UK], Iran also supports "Holocaust revisionist historians, who maintain that the slaughter of Europe?s Jews during the Second World War was invented or exaggerated to justify the creation of Israel on Palestinian territory."

In response, the Israel News Agency launched a seach-engine-optimization contest (Google bomb) -- the Iran Holocaust Cartoon Contest -- to prevent the Iranian site from attaining a high Google rankins.

Most American and UK media have declined to publish. However, they can be viewed at various websites, including The Economist and the Brussels Journal.

Cartoonist Daryl Cagle outlines other instances where Muslims have protested political cartoons but insists that these are not political cartoons but illustrations.

He quotes Pulitzer Prize-winning cartoonist Doug Marlette of the Tallahassee Democrat, object of a protest orchestrated by the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR):

• I was used to negative reactions from religious interest groups, but not the kind of sustained violent intensity of the Islamic threats. The nihilism and culture of death of a religion that sanctions suicide bombers, and issues fatwas on people who draw funny pictures, is certainly of a different order and fanatical magnitude than the protests of our home-grown religious true believers

Cagle concludes:

• Muslim countries expect the press in Denmark to suppress cartoons that would be offensive to them, but they don't extend the same cartoon courtesy to others that they demand for themselves. Cartoons in the Arab press are typically so ugly and racist that American audiences have never seen anything like them. Middle Eastern cartoon venom is targeted toward Israel, often depicting Jews with hooked noses and orthodox garb, sometimes with fangs and bloody teeth, often in the roles of Nazis. The Jews are sometimes shown crucifying Arabs in a "Jews killed Jesus" scenario, or enacting their own concentration camp Holocausts on their neighbors, along with their henchmen, the Americans. The cartoons are designed to be as offensive to Jews as possible, and are seen as nothing out of the ordinary by Middle Eastern newspaper readers.
  
  Unless we defend our funny little drawings with the same zeal that we see from the victims of our irreverence, we'll continue to see our freedoms constricted by the loud voices of those we offend.

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