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The fallout from the Danish cartoons gets worse: 11 demonstrators now dead in Afghanistan and Norwegian soldiers there attacked, an attack on an international observers' mission in Hebron, Bangladeshi demonstrators trying to attack the Italian Embassy in Dhaka. The editor of Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper that started it all, has a lot on his conscience. The situation is dangerously out of control. Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen has little credibility in the Muslim world but we can agree with him on one thing — that this is now a "global crisis".
The air is being poisoned with blanket accusations and counter allegations — by Europeans that Muslims who are increasingly intolerant, by Muslims that it is the Europeans who are increasingly intolerant. That is a gross exaggeration on both parts. There are hundreds of dailies across Europe; only a handful reprinted the odious cartoons. Others could have done so; they chose not to. Most Europeans have not seen them nor wish to. Likewise, while Muslims worldwide are deeply offended by the cartoons, their protests have been overwhelmingly peaceful and dignified.
Yet both these sides to the affair are ...
