Given the ferocity and volume of stuff on the Internet it’s absurd to maintain that the rather banal and insignificant 13:51 short about the life of Mohamed was an intentional provocation.
But this sure looks it.
Charlie Hebdo is a notoriously unrestrained satiric magazine.
Wikipedia describes the magazine as having a “strongly left wing, anarchist slant.”
What was this supposed to provoke, given not only the current furor in the Muslim world but that the president of France is a Socialist?
This could be a left wing provocation intended to give the president and the government an excuse to change the law in a more Shariah friendly direction.
But it is undeniable that it is likely to aid the right by embarrassing the government and feeding French anti-immigration sentiment.
Hard to tell, sometimes, what the further left could possibly be thinking.
Says the news story,
"We have the impression that it's officially allowed for Charlie Hebdo to attack the Catholic far-right but we cannot poke fun at fundamental Islamists," said editor Stephane Charbonnier, who drew the front-page cartoon.
"It shows the climate - everyone is driven by fear, and that is exactly what this small handful of extremists who do not represent anyone want - to make everyone afraid, to shut us all in a cave," he told Reuters.
. . . .
Charlie Hebdo has a long reputation for being provocative. Its Paris offices were firebombed last November after it published a mocking caricature of Mohammad, and Charbonnier has been under police guard ever since.
Nothing in the story about a presidential reaction, though the French state is going to an awful lot of trouble to prepare for Muslim reaction.
This is AP.
The story throws more light on the motivation.
Looks like pure, “Up yours” free speech advocacy.
Particularly given the history of prior provocations, for this magazine and this editor.
Give him credit for sack.
Internet attacks have crashed their site, for now.
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