Rotten in Denmark
Flemming Rose and the clash of civilizations by Justin Raimondo
The publication of
12 cartoons in
Jyllands-Posten, a
Danish right-wing newspaper, that caricatured the prophet Muhammad was clearly a provocation – and it has had its intended effect. The editor responsible
claims the genesis of the cartoons was the alleged reluctance of artists to illustrate an upcoming children's biography of Muhammad: they are supposedly too afraid to step forward, fearing violent retaliation. All this
before anyone had so much as raised their voices over the matter: now, of course, the subject
dominates headlines throughout much of Europe and the Middle East.
Riots
throughout the Muslim world,
demands for the
expulsion of the Danish ambassador from a number of countries, attacks on the
Danish (
and Norwegian) embassies in Beirut and Damascus – this incident couldn't have roiled relations between Islam and the West more if it had been planned that way, which raises the question: was it? Is something
rotten in the state of Denmark? We don't know, and probably will never know, but it is worthwhile looking into the origins of this particular incident, because a very definite
odor is wafting in from the general direction of Copenhagen.
To begin with, the real impetus for the demonstrations and declarations of outrage coming in from all across the Middle East wasn't merely the publication of these rather juvenile scribblings in Denmark, but their republication in several European countries. If this wasn't a coordinated provocation, then it is certainly an amazing coincidence that it bears all the earmarks of one.
Secondly, let us examine the venue – a newspaper that today describes itself as "liberal" in the classical sense, but yesterday
openly supported fascism – and particularly the man most responsible for starting this ruckus:
Flemming Rose, the "cultural editor" of
Jyllands-Posten, who commissioned the cartoons and now is at the center of a rapidly-escalating
controversy.
Here is his
Wikipedia biography, which states that he has "links with U.S. neoconservatives," but lacks citations. Rose is apparently a big fan of
Daniel Pipes – the controversial anti-Arabist appointed by George W. Bush to the
U.S. Institute of Peace – and authored an entirely uncritical profile of Pipes, originally published in
Jyllands-Posten and
translated here.
Pipes is the founder of
Campus Watch, an organization devoted to stamping out any and all academic treatments of Middle Eastern affairs that don't conform to his narrow strictures, which might be mildly described as
fanatically hostile to Islam, Arabs, and anyone who opposes his extreme Israeli nationalism. Campus Watch is engaged in compiling blacklists of professors who refuse to spout the pro-Israel party line, and actively encourages students to
spy on their teachers and report miscreants.
None of this is mentioned in the profile authored by Rose: instead, we are given a long disquisition on his subject's view of "
militant Islam" as a threat supposedly on a par with
communism and
fascism – again, uncritically, in spite of the lack of proportion evinced by such an extravagant claim, to say nothing of the lack of evidence marshaled by Pipes.
More @
http://www.antiwar.com/justin/?articleid=8512