Somebody is whipping up Muslim fury for some reason, and our job now is to figure out what is going on.
We can see what's happening on the TV screen: crazed rioting over some nothing cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad that ran months ago — September — in a Danish newspaper and then later ran in other European papers.
Yes, we know it is forbidden by the Koran to visually depict the prophet. We know Islam forbids idolatry.
We also know that the Koran forbids Muslims doing certain things that some Muslims do anyway.
We also know the Danish newspaper was trying to make a point, which is that Demark had allowed in so many unassimilated Muslims that they appeared to be trying to exercise a veto over the Danes long-held rights of free expression and tolerance for speech one doesn't like.
Nonetheless, some Muslim clerics stirred up this trouble and the question is why.
The Danish newspaper caused the controversy to make a point about free speech
But it now apologizes for causing so much trouble. This after six deaths in rioting and after it appears the experiment has caused the Danes to, in fact, give up some of their free expression.
In Denmark now it's free expression about everything except Muslims.
In Britain, the Muslim population is feeling the backlash over demonstrations many Brits felt went too far in free expression. Calling for anyone who insults Islam to have their head cut off makes a good number of the British public nervous.
The rioting was definitely the goal of a campaign by a few Muslim clerics to stir up Muslims around the world, and it worked.
The clerics even added some cartoons that never ran in the Danish papers to make sure Muslims were extra mad.
Danish products have been pulled from the stores in Saudi Arabia and elsewhere.
The Danish mission burned in Beirut.
A Catholic priest shot to death at a church in Turkey. It may have something to do with all this.
But what's this really all about? The cartoons originally ran in September and here we are with riots in February.
Some say it's an Islamic hissy fit designed to say secular free speech does not trump rules from the Koran. One writer suggested it may have something to do with Iran and its nukes.
Keep your antenna up. This perfectly timed spontaneous rioting is about something.
We'll see soon.
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