As we can see by the various reactions throughout the world, the protestors believe that expressing hate, or disrespect to Islam, or even simply disrespect to the rules of Islam are all in and of themseles crimes. To this imam's mind, a hate crime is not a crime that was excaberated by hate; hate towards Islam is in and of itself a crime, and should be punished by the civil authority.
There have been various statements by Islamic authorities to the effect that freedom of speech does not include freedom to insult or show disrespect towards another's religion. I suspect that they are only including religions other than Islam to try to make their viewpoint more palatable to the West; I would doubt there's any such ecumenicalism in their own countries' laws, or at least in the way those laws are enforced. But that's beside the point; the real issue is that they don't accept the proposition that if you are not free to criticize, or insult, or be rude, or dissaprove, or even to express hate, then you don't have freedom of speech at all.
It is my G-d given right to say what I want about Bible thumping Southern Baptists, pedophile Catholics, Mormons with 20 wives, bike riding Jehovah's Witnesses, kung fu fighting Buddhists, sun worshipping Shintos, Yarmulka wearing Jews, and towel headed Muslims.
The writers of the Constitution agreed too and even wrote an amendment specifically protecting that G-d given right. Any 'religion' that would attempt to deprive me of that right is an enemy of the Constitution, plain and simple.