Christiane Gruber makes the case that The West is under reporting the opposition to ISIS from Muslim cartoonists in the Middle East.
Over the past year, cartoonists across the Middle East have critiqued ISIS with equal amounts of ferocity and fearlessness. From Jordan to Iran, they frequently lambast ISIS?referring to it through its acronym Daesh, which is related to the pejorative Arabic term meaning ?to tread under foot??as destructive of Islam and the world?s cultural heritage, as the growling lapdog of various superpowers, as the ultimate devil and grim reaper of Iraq and as an Oscar-winning sensation obsessed with bloody forms of self-promotion (Figure 1).
She also posts examples. I think she’s painting a rosier picture of opposition from Muslim world editorial cartoonists. What’s not well explained are what percentage of those cartoons are coming from Europe, or safe(r) Middle Eastern countries. It flies in the face of stories of cartoonists going to jail, having their hands beaten or sued by government leaders.
There aren’t any Muslim countries supporting ISIS so this isn’t flying in the face of convention. Even in oppressive countries that punish journalists the cartoonists have approved subjects to criticize.
As we have seen recently, being in Europe or the United States does not necessarily make you safer.
Two Jordanians and an Iranian.
What do I win?
No one likes grammar police, but shouldn’t the headline be “ARE MUSLIM EDITORIAL CARTOONISTS OPPOSING ISIS?”?
You are grammatically correct. Thanks Terry. Corrected.