1.Gatestone Institute（http://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/5016/charlie-hebdo-attack）
We Are Charlie: Free Speech v. Self-Censorshipby Douglas Murray
January 8, 2015 at 5:00 am
Will we keep on blaming the victims? Perhaps the media assume that it is easier to force good people to keep quiet, or keep their own media offices from being attacked, than to than to tackle the problem of Islamic extremism head-on. It is easier to blame Geert Wilders, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Lars Hedegaard, Suzanne Winters, Salman Rushdie or Charlie Hebdo -- and even put some of them on trial -- than to attack the attackers, who might even attack back!
The press and the media seem to prefer coerced self-censorship: It is your own fault if you get hurt: none of this would be happening to you if you had only kept your mouth shut. It is easier to denigrate the people warning us about a danger than it is to address the danger they are warning us about.
Do you think a country should change its policies because segments of one community will run into newspaper offices and gun people down if you don't?
If those in positions of influence do not deal with this problem now, we will not like those who deal with it later.
Wednesday's massacre at the Paris offices of the magazine Charlie Hebdo was not just a barbaric act of jihadist violence. It was also a test for the West and for the freedom of speech in the West. It is a test that we all have been failing.
Those of us who have proposed that all Western -- and in particular European -- news outlets should multilaterally publish the Charlie Hebdo cartoons have been greeted in return with a terrified and terrifyingly self-conscious silence. The papers and broadcasters do not want to do it. Last time they refused to republish the cartoons, from Denmark's Jyllands Posten, they said it was because the cartoons were from a "right wing" newspaper. This time they refuse to republish cartoons from a "left-wing" newspaper. It does not matter what the politics are -- it is not about the politics, it is about the cartoons. The sooner the press at least has the guts to admit this, the better.
But there has been much worse than the cringing surrender that this refusal denotes. Consider just a couple of even worse examples from the mainstream media's coverage of these barbaric events.
In the United Kingdom on Wednesday, the Daily Telegraph newspaper was straight out of the starting blocks. Within a couple of hours of the attack, as the bodies of the slain journalists had not even been identified, The Telegraph chose to run a report headlined, "France faces rising tide of Islamophobia"!
The press was already blaming the victims. Commentators on CNN opined that Charlie Hebdo had been "provoking Muslims" for some time. Perhaps they assum that it is easier to force good people to keep quiet, or keep their own media offices from being attacked, than to tackle to the problem of Islamic extremism head-on. It is easier blame Geert Wilders, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Lars Hedegaard, Suzanne Winters, Salman Rushdie or Charlie Hebdo -- and even put some of them on trial -- than to attack the attackers, who might even attack back!
The press and the media seem to prefer a policy of coerced self-censorship: It is your own fault if you get hurt; none of this would be happening to you if you had only kept your mouth shut. It is easier to denigrate the people warning us about a danger on than it is to address the danger they are warning us about. The same holds true for Europe's policy toward Israel: It is easier to bully an open, pluralistic democracy than to take on all those terrorists and the countries that support them, and it is to do what is necessary to get them to stop. That is also what Germany's Chancellor Angela Merkel broadcast in her New Year's message when she warned against the anti-Islamic "Pegida" marches in Germany: she said it was the marchers against Islamic extremism that have "coldness" in their hearts, not the propagators of Islamic extremism.
And so the Telegraph's first response piece listed the terrible events of the rise of right-wing and other forces -- as though the attack were the response to radical Islam, rather than even suggest that it might be radical Islam itself that was at fault. Once again, the "backlash" against Muslims took precedence over the actual murder of non-Muslims at the hands of Muslim fanatics.
Over in New York, The New York Daily News is not a newspaper that tends to pull its punches. But consider what it did while the dead were still lying in the magazine's offices. It ran a story which showed images of a Parisian policeman at the moment that the terrorists -- shouting "Allahu Akhbar" ["Allah is Greater!"] -- gunned him down in cold blood. It also showed an image from 2011 of Charlie Hebdo editor and publisher Stéphane Charbonnier standing outside his firebombed offices, the last time the magazine was attacked, holding up an edition of the paper with an image of Mohammed on the front. But the image was pixelated. Yes -- that's right. The paper was willing to show a man who had been alive that morning in the process of being murdered. But they chose not to publish a cartoon of a historical figure who died 1400 years ago.
Stéphane Charbonnier, the editor and publisher of Charlie Hebdo, who was murdered yesterday along with many of his colleagues, is shown here in front of the magazine's former offices, just after they were firebombed in November 2011.
This is the pass that the free press has come to, even in countries such as America, and even in places where there has been no attack on a newspaper's offices for "insulting" somebody else's prophet. And then again, in the tide-wave of bafflement, the same excuses have begun to get rolled out:
"Has this to do with France's foreign policy?" interviewers and pundits have mused. In this particular instance, the answer to that question is "no more than usual." But the follow-on bit of the answer should be even more easily said: "So what if it were?" Let us say that you do not like France's foreign policy. Do you think that a country should change its policies because segments of one community will run into newspaper offices and gun people down if you don't?
Another diversionary question has been, has been, "Does this have something to do with the situations in which many French Muslims find themselves – the banlieues (less-affluent French suburbs) and so forth?" The only answer I have so far managed to give to this question is that there are really people out there who may not like where they live but do not run into newspaper offices with Kalashnikov rifles and start firing off. Many people do not like their neighborhoods. It is not the point.
Other media have gone straight for the placatory option. Across in Britain, from left to right, the response was the same: "British Muslim leaders all come out in opposition to Paris magazine attack." As though head-shaking constituted some great breakthrough. There seems to be a long-term pattern -- no matter how often the attackers shout "Allahu Akbar!" or announce, as yesterday, that, "The Prophet [Mohammad] has been avenged" -- of condemning terrorist attacks in general, accompanied by bewilderment at the thought that they that it could have anything do with "Islam."
There are also great loud woolly condemnations of "terrorism," but never accompanied by naming the men or groups involved. And will we keep on blaming the victims? This all bodes very ill.
Charlie Hebdo was -- I hope I can still say "is" -- a magazine that satirizes any and all ideas. Their targets have included not only Mohammed, but also Christians, Jews, the French novelist Michel Houellebecq and the Front National leader Marine le Pen. At this moment, mainstream media and politicians should be ensuring that they understand the concerns of their publics, rather than treating them as radioactive "racists" and "Islamophobes." If those in positions of influence do not deal with this problem now, we will not like those who deal with it later.
2.Investigative Project（http://www.investigativeproject.org/4719/charlie-hebdo-martyrs-for-the-truth）
Charlie Hebdo: Martyrs for the Truthby Abigail R. Esman
Special to IPT News
January 7, 2015
With the massacre of Charlie Hebdo magazine's editors and cartoonists in Paris by Islamic gunmen early Wednesday afternoon, the forces of radical Islam lay the gauntlet down: radical Islam is not just fighting against Western freedom, or the hegemony of Western powers. Their real enemy is truth.
The killing of the Charlie Hebdo staff was not the first time Islamists have made a point of murdering journalists or commentators, or the first time they have risen up against satirists in the West. The record is rich with them: the slaughter in broad daylight of Theo van Gogh on the streets of Amsterdam in November, 2004; the many attempts on the life of Kurt Westergaard, the Danish cartoonist responsible for the drawings of Mohammed with a bomb in his turban; the plot to kill Swedish cartoonist Lars Viks, for similar drawings; the kidnap and murder of American journalist Steven Vincent in response to his New York Times article exposing corruption in the Basra police force in 2005; the beheadings of James Foley and Steven Sotloff in 2014; and the 2011 bombing of the Charlie Hebdo offices in response to the magazine's own publication of cartoons about Mohammed. Among others.
(And that doesn't even address the strong-arming and censorship of Muslim countries – even "democratic" Turkey, which, under the iron hand of Islamist president (and former prime minister) Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has been condemned internationally for its imprisonment of journalists. Indeed, on a list of 170 countries graded on press freedom, Turkey, Pakistan, Egypt, and Saudi Arabi a stand at 154, 158, 159, and 164, respectively.)
But what is most terrifying about the Charlie Hebdo massacre is the fact that we can no longer hide behind excuses about "lone wolf" terrorists who are "unbalanced" or "disturbed." Such descriptions are the way in which both media and public officials have attempted to minimize the impulses behind attacks such as the one in Fort Hood in 2009, or the attempts to behead two police officers in the streets of New York. What today's events in Paris make clear is that this is not the work of individual crazies, and that Islam is, in fact, a part of the equation.
It's time to stop pretending otherwise.
Let's be clear: the killers announced after their rampage that "this was vengeance for the Prophet Mohammed." Some witnesses claim that at least one of the men cried "Allahu Akbar," ("Allah is great"), the rallying cry of Islamic terrorists. And while many Muslim organizations condemned the attack, other Muslims have taken to Facebook and other social media to praise them.
But as CNN's Anderson Cooper said, "This was an attack on journalism." And an attack on journalism is an attack against truth, against insight, against knowledge – against the Enlightenment.
The weapons may not be new, but the frontier Muslim extremists are fighting on – the destruction of the media, of truth – is one we have not paid enough attention to before.
In many cases, we've perhaps contributed to it: most American and other Western publications refused to republish the Danish Mohammed cartoons after they first set off international rioting among Muslims. And even the Bush administration spoke out against them, saying "We find them offensive, and we certainly understand why Muslims would find these images offensive."
And in 2012, White House spokesman Jay Carney criticized Charlie Hebdo for publishing cartoons mocking Mohammed.
"[W]e have questions about the judgment of publishing something like this. We know that these images will be deeply offensive to many and have the potential to be inflammatory. But we've spoken repeatedly about the importance of upholding the freedom of expression that is enshrined in our Constitution," Carney said.
"In other words, we don't question the right of something like this to be published; we just question the judgment behind the decision to publish it. And I think that that's our view about the video that was produced in this country and has caused so much offense in the Muslim world."
Perhaps in this, Charlie Hebdo was way ahead of the rest of us: they, along with the editors of the Danish Jyllands Posten, which first published the "Mohammed cartoons," have been fighting back from the very start. Shockingly, even Western commentators (and especially Western Muslims) condemned the cartoonists in Denmark, just as they condemned Theo van Gogh and, today, Charlie Hebdo for "inviting" these attacks through their "recklessness."
Nothing Charlie Hebdo ever did was "reckless," any more than Steven Vincent's reporting was reckless, any more than Theo van Gogh's film Submission, about honor killings and the abuse of women in Islam, was reckless. In Charlie Hebdo 's case, it was about satire on the face of it – but more than that, their work was about the very urgent need to preserve free expression, and to condemn – in any and all ways possible – those who seek to destroy it.
In the memory of those who died for truth and freedom, we cannot give up that fight – and we cannot afford to lose it.
・Abigail R. Esman, the author, most recently, of Radical State: How Jihad Is Winning Over Democracy in the West (Praeger, 2010), is a freelance writer based in New York and the Netherlands.
3.MEMRI(http://www.memrijttm.org/online-jihad-supporters-celebrate-attack-on-headquarters-of-french-weekly-charlie-hebdo.html)
7 January 2015
Online Jihad Supporters Celebrate Attack On Headquarters Of French Satirical Weekly 'Charlie Hebdo'
Jihadists online celebrated today's deadly shooting at the Paris headquarters of the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, which has satirized Islam and the Prophet Muhammad in some of its issues.[1] Participants on jihadi forums and social media praised the attackers, saying that the shooting was a legitimate act of revenge against the weekly for insulting Islam and against France for its crimes against Muslims.
Reactions On The Forum Jihadi Media Platform
Members of the pro-ISIS forum Jihadi Media Platform (alplatformmedia.com) lashed out at France. A member called Al-Dia' Al-Gharib wrote: "France was [once] part of the land of Islam and will return to be the land of Islam, in spite the worshippers of the Cross." Another, who goes by the name Muhib Al-Salihin, wrote: "France is one of the harshest enemies of Islam and of the Islamic State in particular." Forum member Abu Al-Qassem Al-Shawqi commented: "[This] is news that quenches the thirst for revenge. By Allah, beloved ones, let us not think lightly of prayers. By Allah, they [the attackers] are soldiers of Allah." And a member calling himself Abu Bakr Al-Zari'ni remarked: "Congratulations to France and to its people for reaping what their hands sowed. Did these evil cartoonists think that we were a nation that would remain silent in face of those who insult our Prophet…? Did [French President] Hollande and the governments that preceded him think that their interventions and despotism in the lands of the Muslims would not be met with retribution? No, by Allah, from now on the youths of Islam will no longer remain silent, especially since we have a state [ISIS] to mobilize armies if anybody insults the nation of Islam."
Arabic Reactions On Twitter
Arabic-speaking jihad supporters also celebrated the attack on Twitter, some using the Arabic hashtag "Paris Is Burning." Many of them shared videos from the scene of the attack, calling the shooters "heroes" and praising them for avenging the honor of the Prophet and of Islam. One, who calls himself Najam (@35njm), wrote: "#Paris Is Burning. Oh Allah slaughter them, Allah attack them. This newspaper insulted the Messenger of Allah and Islam." ISIS supporter Hamel Al-Liwa' (@blue964) tweeted: "Fear prevails among the newspapers and journalists who hate Islam. There are demands for military protection of the paper headquarters. #Paris is turning into a military barracks." Another ISIS supporter, Al-Khilafa Hiya Al-Hal ["the Caliphate is the solution"] (@death4x), shared a video of the attack and commented: "France turned the lands of the Muslims into battlefields, and now the Muslims have turned Paris into a battlefield. Allah akbar."
French Reactions On Twitter
The following are some reactions by French-speaking jihadists on Twitter. ISIS supporter Abou Hafs (@Ansar_Al_Ouma) tweeted: "Oh Allah, the honor of your prophet has been cleansed." Another, Al Furat Wadijlah (@AlFuratWadijlah), commented on the character of the attack: "An RPG7 with Kalashnikovs, it's a well prepared assault." He added: "That dog Charb [Charlie Hebdo editor-in-chief and cartoonist Stéphane Charbonnier, who is one of those killed in the attack] was supposed to publish this drawing on the first page this week:"
The caption of the cartoon says "Still no terror attacks in France." The jihadist comments: "Wait! We have until the end of January to give [you] our [new year's] greetings."
French ISIS fighter Abu-Talhal (@Abu-Talhal ) expressed regret that the shooters did not have cameras mounted on their guns: "They were lone wolves [smiley] haha. A go-pro 'camera' on their AK47s, walking to Charlie Hebdo, that would be nice." Jihad supporter Ibn Mustafa (@Ibn_mustafa_51), like many others who commented, reminded his readers that the shari'a punishment for insulting Allah and the Prophet is death: "This is the status and punishment in Islam for those who insult Allah and his messenger." ISIS supporter Kheyrad dine (@Kheyradine) warned against the reaction of the French authorities: "There will certainly be many arrests of pro-ISIS brothers, [so] arm yourselves and don't turn your backs. Be soldiers of Allah." He added a threat to the French president: "Die in your rage… Haha, the next one is the president, Inshallah… Brothers, fire up the volcanoes of Jihad, go forth to paradise that is as wide as the heavens and the earth. Allah's victory is close! The hearts of the infidels are trembling, Allah be praised! As for the news about the brothers [who carried out the attack], may Allah grant them the highest of ranks! Pray for them!"
English Tweets
Various jihadists also tweeted in English. The British Umm Hussain Britaniyya (@UmmHussain107), who resides in Syria and is married to an ISIS fighter, wrote: "Who printed cartoons of our Prophet and our Caliph Ibrahim, you filthy kuffs [infidels]." Australian ISIS fighter Abdul Ali (@abdul_ali_) wrote: "Lions of Islam roaring in France"
A Dutch pro-ISIS twitter page called "Fighting Journalist" (@FightingJmedia) featured the message: "Takbeer!!!... Vive Le France!!! You can insult the prophet and pay the price 20 years later!"
It should be mentioned that Al-Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP) put Charlie Hebdo editor and cartoonist Stéphane Charbonnier on a "most wanted" poster published its English-language magazine Inspire in March 2013.
[1] Perhaps coincidentally, the attack occurred hours after the weekly published a cartoon of ISIS leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi earlier today.
4.Simon Wiesenthal Center(http://www.wiesenthal.com/site/apps/nlnet/content.aspx?c=lsKWLbPJLnF&b=8776547&ct=14440003¬oc=1)
BREAKING NEWS:
Wiesenthal Center Expresses Condolences to Victims of Today’s Massacre in Paris
“The only way such horrendous acts will cease is when the 6,000 Imans in France publicly condemn these acts as well as the ideology and theology behind them and when they deliver this message consistently to every mosque in France”
January 7, 2015
Paris — In a letter to the editorial team of Charlie Hebdo magazine, Wiesenthal Center French President, Richard Odier and Director for International Relations, Dr. Shimon Samuels, expressed, "Horror at today's atrocity, our sympathy to the families of its victims and prayers for the wounded."
Samuels noted, "In 2005, we shared the same courtroom with Charlie Hebdo's then-editor, Philippe Val, as we were both charged with defamation by a French Palestinian solidarity organisation."
Odier added, "Today is a black day for freedom of expression, tolerance and respect in France as the very values of the Republic are under attack."
Samuels stressed, "Jihadi fanaticism and terrorism are the same reality for its victims, whether in France, Israel or beyond."
The Centre urged that, "The authorities draw the lessons of today and crack down on these threats with all measures available."
In a statement released from the international headquarters of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles, Rabbis Marvin Hier, SWC Founder and Dean and Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean said that on behalf of the 400,000 constituent families of the Wiesenthal Center, “We want to add our voice of condolence and solidarity for the victims, 10 journalists and 2 policemen, who were massacred today in Paris. As we told President Hollande during our meeting at the Elysee Palace this past June, the only way such horrendous acts will cease in France is when the 6,000 Imans in France publicly condemn such acts as well as the ideology and theology behind them and when they deliver this message consistently in every mosque in France."
5.Algemeiner（http://www.algemeiner.com）
Car Explodes Outside Paris Synagogue Hours After Magazine Attack, 7 January 2015
by Ben Cohen
A car exploded outside a synagogue near Paris just hours after Islamist terrorists murdered twelve people in a gun assault on the offices of satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.
Initial reports were unclear as to whether the cause of the explosion was a bomb, with some correspondents suggesting that the blast was the result of a mechanical failure.
The explosion, in the mixed Muslim-Jewish suburb of Sarcelles – the site of violent anti-Semitic demonstrations last summer, during the war in Gaza between Israel and Hamas – took place at approximately 2:30 pm local time.
Sarcelles Mayor Francois Pupponi said that the car explosion was an “accidental, unrelated incident” not connected to the Charlie Hebdo shooting.
French Jewish news outlet JSS News reported that an initial police assessment concluded that the explosion was an accident. However, JSS also pointed out that the car was parked by a roundabout where “it is strictly forbidden to stop.” The paper also questioned whether a mechanical fault could have caused such an intense explosion.
・This story will be updated as further reports come in.
6.Spero(http://www.speroforum.com)
France: Terrorists attack magazine headquarters
7 January 2015
by Martin Balillas
At least two gunmen wielding what have been described as assault rifles attacked the headquarters of France’s famed satirical magazine ‘Charlie Hebdo’ in a murderous assault in Paris today. Local reports say that the pair charged into the headquarters of the magazine and opened fire. Among the dead are Stephane Charbonnier, a.k.a. Charb, who was a famed cartoonist and chief editor of the magazine.
At least 12 fatalities have been reported. Among them are two police officers who responded to the attack. The two gunmen remain at large and are the subject of a nationwide man-hunt. President François Hollande made a subsequent statement lamenting the deaths, calling today’s incident a ‘terrorist attack’. Speaking at the scene of the assault, Hollande told the press that the shoot-out was “undoubtedly a terrorist attack”. He also said that “several terrorist attacks were thwarted in recent weeks.”
Reportedly, the assailants were armed with AK-47 automatic weapons, as well as a rocket-propelled grenade launcher. France has now set the alert level in the metro Paris area at the highest level.
‘Charlie Hebdo’drew the ire of Muslims and terrorists worldwide, as well as repeated death threats, for its caricatures of Mohammed – the founder of Islam – as well as other drawings. Terrorists struck the offices of the magazine with a firebomb attack in November 2011, following the publication of drawings that offended some Muslims.
British Prime Minister David Cameron and German Chancellor Angela Merkel have condemned the attack. Merkel said that it was not only attack on France, but on freedoms of the press and free speech.
・Spero News editor Martin Barillas is a former US diplomat, who also worked as a democracy advocate and election observer in Latin America. He is also a freelance translator.（End）
