Death toll mounts in worldwide protests against anti-Muslim cartoons

TEHRAN - One of Iran's biggest newspapers on Tuesday called for artists to submit caricatures on the Holocaust, saying it wants to target a subject as taboo in the West as the Prophet Muhammad is for Muslims.

The daily Hamshahri, one of Iran's five biggest newspapers, said its contest for Holocaust cartoons was meant as a test of the West's principle of freedom of _expression.

The newspaper invited foreign and Iranian artists to send in cartoons about the Nazi genocide against the Jews, saying it would publish more details on the rules on Monday. The contest is being organized in cooperation with the House of Caricatures, a Tehran exhibition center for cartoons.

Does the West extend freedom of _expression to the crimes committed by the United States and Israel, or an event such as the Holocaust? Or is its freedom only for insulting religious sanctities?" a short article on the back page of Hamshahri said.

Both the paper and the center are owned by the Tehran Municipality, which is dominated by allies of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, who is well known for his opposition to Israel.

EU warns Iran
The call for Holocaust cartoons was announced as the EU's executive office warned Iran Tuesday that attempts to boycott Danish goods or cancel trade contracts with European countries would lead to a further rupture in already cool relations.

The EU was trying to confirm comments made by Iran's president that the country should boycott Danish products in protest of cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed, EU spokesman Johannes Laitenberger told reporters.

"A boycott of Danish goods is by definition a boycott of European goods," Laitenberger said. "A boycott hurts the economic interests of all parties, also those who are boycotting and can damage the growing trade links between the EU and the countries concerned."

Riots continue across Muslim world
Rioters clashed with police and NATO peacekeepers across Afghanistan on Tuesday in continuing demonstrations against the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, officials and witnesses said.

Several people were wounded, and Norwegian soldiers said they were attacked.

Two Norwegians were reported slightly hurt in the attack by about 200-300 demonstrators at the Meymaneh camp of the ISAF international peace force, a ministry spokesman said.

In the capital, Kabul, police used batons to beat stone-throwing protesters outside the Danish diplomatic mission office, as well as in another riot near the offices of the World Bank.

An Associated Press reporter said police arrested several people, many of whom were injured.

Earlier Tuesday, hundreds of Muslims burned a Danish flag in the southern Philippines and urged a boycott of that country's products.

The protesters, mainly religious students, gathered at the city square in Cotabato, 880 kilometers southeast of Manila, demanding that Denmark's government take action against the newspaper that first published the cartoons.

Meanwhile, Denmark advised its citizens to leave Indonesia as anger over the drawings spread across the world's most populous Muslim nation, the Danish ambassador to Indonesia said Tuesday.

Of course, the cartoons are offensive to Muslims, but newspaper cartoons do not warrant the burning of buildings and the killing of innocent people. The cartoons did not cause the disease of hate that we are seeing in the Muslim world.

In school in Gaza, I learned hate, vengeance, and retaliation. Peace was never an option. At school we sang songs with verses calling Jews "dogs." Hundreds of millions of other Muslims also have been raised with the same hatred of the West and Israel as a way to distract from the failings of their leaders.
Is it any surprise that after decades of indoctrination in a culture of hate, that people actually do hate? Arab society has created a system of relying on fear of a common enemy. It's a system that has brought them much-needed unity, cohesion, and compliance in a region ravaged by tribal feuds, instability, violence, and selfish corruption. So Arab leaders blame Jews and Christians rather than provide good schools, roads, hospitals, housing, jobs, or hope to their people.

For 30 years I lived inside this war zone of oppressive dictatorships and police states. Citizens competed to appease and glorify their dictators, but they looked the other way when Muslims tortured and terrorized other Muslims. It's time for Arabs and Muslims to stand up for their families. We must stop allowing our leaders to use the West and Israel as an excuse to distract from their own failed leadership and their citizens' lack of freedoms.

Muslims need jobs - not jihad. Unless we recognize that the culture of hate is the true root of the riots surrounding this cartoon controversy, this violent overreaction will only be the start of a clash of civilizations that the world cannot bear.