Update Feb-08: I'm glad to see that someone's getting something out of this:
When entrepreneur Ahmed Abu Dayya first heard that Danish caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad were being reprinted across Europe, he knew exactly what his customers in Gaza would want: flags to burn.
Abu Dayya ordered 100 hard-to-find Danish and Norwegian flags for his Gaza City shop and has been doing a swift trade.
Oh, and this part is precious:
Abu Dayya sources some of his flags from suppliers in Taiwan, but he buys Israeli flags from a merchant in Israel, even though he sells them to be burnt at anti-Israeli rallies.
* * *
This violence over political cartoons is in some ways scarier to me than the terrorist attacks that have happened in the last couple of years. It's scary enough that large numbers of people from many different countries are in an uproar against entire countries over the actions of newspapers in those countries. What's even scarier is that they're destroying entire consulates. (Oh, and let's not forget that while the Scandinavian countries involved do not deserve that kind of treatment, they're also not completely innocent, since anti-Muslim sentiment is quite strong in Europe.)
So optimists like me tend to think that information flow is a good thing, that the truth will find its way... But I'm not sure any more. I feel like the Internet and the globalization of media has led to faster dissemination of propaganda and the easier creation of larger mobs. This recent global mobilization of anti-Danish riots would likely not have happened in the days before the Internet and satellite TV. Brave new world...
Incidentally, I don't know whether to laugh or cry at this bit:
"We do not print the papers -- the government does not print the papers," [Danish Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller] said. "There's freedom of expression."
He repeatedly explained that Denmark has a law against blasphemy, and it is up to the courts -- not the Danish government -- to decide whether a newspaper is guilty of blasphemy."
(1) Denmark has a law against blasphemy?! (2) If they do, how can they claim freedom of expression as a defense against, well, blashphemy?!