The Line In The Sand

When Obama gave his speech at the United Nations last week, he tried simultaneously to excuse the recent Muslim riots over the YouTube film "Innocence of Muslims," he managed to motivate Egypt and Yemen to draw the proverbial line in the sand.

According to this article in the September 29, 2012 edition of the Washington Post:

...[The presidents of Egypt and Yemen] made it clear that their brands of popularly chosen government do not look like the United States or share all of its values.

“We expect from others, as they expect from us, that they respect our cultural specifics and religious references and not seek to impose concepts or cultures that are unacceptable to us,” Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi told the U.N. gathering Wednesday.

Morsi, on the job three months, told the U.N. that the protests outside the U.S. Embassy in Cairo reflected the legitimate, and decidedly Islamic, voice of Egyptian popular will. And he effectively told Obama he would have to get used to new rules.

“Insults against the prophet of Islam, Muhammad, are not acceptable,” said Morsi, whose political roots lie in the Muslim Brotherhood. “We will not allow anyone to do this by word or by deed.”

In an interview with The Washington Post on Saturday [September 29, 2012], Yemeni President Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi sounded a similar note...

All of Obama's many statements about values that the West shares with the Islam and the glory of the Arab Spring have not gone unnoticed by leaders in the Middle East.  The following, dated September 13, 2012, did not go unnoticed, either:

...Obama administration officials said Thursday that they have asked YouTube to review the video and determine whether it violates the site's terms of service...

Some media observers predict that the incident will prompt calls for Google Inc.'s YouTube to play a more active role in curating the billions of hours of videos found on its site. One prominent 1st Amendment lawyer even suggested that YouTube should seek a judge's ruling about whether to remove potentially incendiary content.

Also, let us recall Obama's Cairo speech in June of 2009.  What message did that speech actually send?

Muslims are committed to what they believe and act on what they believe. Can we say the same for the West's commitment to freedom of expression?

Additional reading: "The Anti-Blasphemy, Anti-First-Amendment President" by Diana West. Excerpt:

Clearly, this president is not protecting free speech as our founders guaranteed it, and, in fact, he gravely endangers it. Meanwhile, if I choose to write against child rape as condoned under Islamic law with roots in Muhammad’s consummation of a marriage with a 9-year-old – Islamic “slander,” for sure – in what way is the “mutual respect” President Obama calls for even conceivable as an antidote?

Here’s the secret that blasphemy laws are written to smother: Regarding the fundamentals of freedom of conscience, the autonomy of the individual, protection of children and equality of women, Islamic and Western doctrines have nothing in common and are, in fact, at irreconcilable, dagger’s-point odds. Silence – Shariah blasphemy laws – is the Obama-Clinton-OIC Islamic answer. Indeed, in the Shariah-compliant end, silence will replace the questions, too.

But we’re already used to it. Don’t believe me? Afshin Ellian, an Iranian-born Dutch law professor, poet and columnist, puts it this way: “If you cannot say that Islam is a backward religion and that Muhammad is a criminal, then you are living in an Islamic country, my friend, because there you also cannot say such things. I may say Christ was a homosexual and Mary was a prostitute, but apparently I should stay off of Muhammad.”

Read the entire essay HERE.