Posted on 02/13/2006 5:58:06 PM PST by jmc1969
A controversial contest for cartoons of the Holocaust was launched in Iran on Monday in a tit-for-tat move over the caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed that have enflamed Muslims worldwide.
The first entry was said to be from renowned Australian cartoonist Michael Leunig, according to the Website organizing the competition with Iran's biggest selling newspaper Hamshahri, triggering outrage in the United States and Germany in particular.
"As a show of solidarity with the Muslim world, and an exercise in free speech, I would like to submit a cartoon to you on the theme of the Holocaust," Leunig was quoted as saying in a statement on the Irancartoons.com Website.
Hardline President Mahmud Ahmadinejad has already prompted international anger by dismissing the systematic slaughter by the Nazis of mainland Europe's Jews as a "myth" used to justify the creation of Israel.
The first of Leunig's two cartoons on the Website show a poor man with a Star of David on his back walking toward the Auschwitz death camp in 1945 with the words "Work Brings Freedom" over the entrance.
The second shows the same scene but depicting "Israel 2002" with the slogan "War Brings Peace" over the entrance and the same man walking toward it bearing a rifle.
"I have had some difficulty getting this work published in my own country, and I believe it would help highlight the hypocrisy of the West's attitude to free speech if you were to publish it," the Melbourne-based Leunig was quoted as saying.
Hamshahri, which is published by Tehran's conservative municipality, said that the contest was officially launched on Monday with the title "What is the limit on freedom of expression in the West?"
Its graphics editor Farid Mortazavi said earlier this month that the aim was to turn the tables on the assertion that newspapers can print offensive material in the name of freedom of expression.
Anger over cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed, first published in Denmark in September, has boiled over into violent demonstrations across much of the Muslim world.
"Freedom of expression has always been a pretext for Westerners ... to insult the beliefs of Muslims," Hamshahri charged in its advertisement for the contest.
"This assault is taking place while criticizing many issues such as the crimes of the United States and Israel as well as historical events like the Holocaust are seen as an unforgivable crime all over the West."
Iran's fiercely anti-Israeli regime is supportive of so-called Holocaust revisionist historians, who maintain that the systematic slaughter by the Nazis of mainland Europe's Jews as well as other groups during World War II has been either invented or exaggerated.
The newspaper said that the contest was open until May 5. It did not announce what the prize would be but said that each artist would receive a book of the cartoons submitted.
Just heard on the local TV News...Australian cartoonist denies submission of cartoons, made via anonymous e-mail. Authorities investigating.
Abraham wasn't a Jew.
Oh, wow! What a prize!
The description of the "cartoon" did not arouse me to anger, or hilarity, or to any emotion that I would associate with cartoons.
What I got was ... sadness. To try to mock and make fun of such a serious calamity is just ... sad. It's like making fun of the Tsunami, or Afghanistan's earthquake.
I know it's intended to be disrespectful, but it just comes across as stupid.
If the Times ever runs an asshole of the year award Leunig should definitely be a winner. What a dipstick.
Hogan's Heroes was offensive to viewers in Boston 20+ years after the series ended but there is a difference between bad taste (or offensiveness) and prohibited works.
I could believe that antisemites in America still produce cartoons for their newsletters. Some proPalestinian war cartoons also have antisemetic themes. I know that the American left supports the Palestinian War (with some even supporting the use of suicide bombers) but I haven't seen the more extremist antisemetic cartoons in the barking moonbat newspapers. Then again, I don't look at them much either.
The website Irancartoons.com is an ad site, not a website.
Sounds like it might be a hoax after all.
Leunig denies entering Holocaust cartoon competition
By Emma Rodgers. Posted: Tuesday, February 14 2006 .
Reports that cartoonist Michael Leunig was the first to enter a contest set up by an Iranian newspaper for cartoons of the Holocaust are not true, he says.
It looks as if Leunig is a victim of a hoax, which he describes as a hurtful act.
"I've been set up horribly, maliciously and to me it denotes what it means to stand up against this conflict and this warlike sort of state the world is in and you know, it's difficult," he said.
Iranian newspaper Hamshahri set up the contest called, "The Boundaries of Western Freedom of Speech" as a reaction to the controversy surrounding the Mohammad cartoons.
A statement purporting to be from Leunig was also published by the newspaper, according to the Herald Sun, (the story has now been removed) which read: "I have had some difficulty getting this work published in my own country, and I believe it would help highlight the hypocrisy of the Wests' attitude to free speech if you were to publish it."
The cartoons, which Leunig has described as "a serious hoax" have now been removed, Hamshahri's editor said.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/arts/articulate/200602/s1569315.htm
Pictures?
I've never seen a devil portrayed with blue wings.
Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are sometimes referred to as the "Abrahamic religions", because of the role Abraham plays in their holy books and beliefs. In the Hebrew Bible and the Qur'an, Abraham is described as a patriarch blessed by God (the Jewish people called him "Father Abraham"), and promised great things, father of the People of Israel through his son Isaac; the Muslims regard Ishmael as the father of the Arabs. In Islam, Abraham is considered to be one of the most important of the many prophets sent by God. In Christian belief, Abraham is a model of faith, and his intention to obey God by offering up Isaac is seen as a foreshadowing of God's offering of his son, Jesus. In Islamic belief, Abraham obeyed God by offering up Ishmael.
His original name was Abram (אַבְרָם "High/Exalted father/leader", Standard Hebrew Avram, Tiberian Hebrew ʾAḇrām); he was the foremost of the Biblical patriarchs. Later in life he went by the name Abraham. There is no contemporary mention of his life, and no source earlier than Genesis mentions him. He probably lived between 2166 BC and 1991 BC. According to the Jewish tradition, Abraham was born 1,948 years after creation and lived for 175 years, which would correspond to a life spanning from 1812 BCE to 1637 BCE.
but who's counting
I'll give it the old college try:
Presidetnt Ahmadinejad, Ted Rall and Cindy Sheehan jump off the Empire State Building. Who hit's the ground first?
Answer: Who cares?
see #27. Hold your horses.
Who knew blowing up our skyscrapers was an olive branch? And the Danes ruined it for us.
Since when do men use this kind of effeminate lingo?
It's a pile of sh*t is what it is, and the fact that these asswipes can run this kind of "contest" without the UN condeming it is indicative of the anti-semites that have the UN by the short hairs.
1.3 BILLION mooselimbs
Yes, he was Hebrew. Not a Jew. That came later, after the diaspora.
I think the point was that "Jews" (Those from the tribe of Judah) didn't exist until after Judah. Abraham was pre-judah by quite a bit.
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