Muslim Cleric, Merchants Offer Prizes to Cartoonist Killers

Pakistani Muslims offer cash and prizes to killers of Danish cartoonists--MSNBC.com.

PESHAWAR, Pakistan.  Muslim cleric Maulana Yousef Qureshi today offered a prize of 500,000 rupees, worth $8,400 at current exchange rates, to anyone who kills Danish cartoonists who drew caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad, and others moved quickly to top his offer.

"We will see Qureshi and raise him," said Mohammed Saeed, head of a Pakistani jewelers' association that announced a $1 million prize.  "Also, we are throwing in a lovely ruby and cubic zirconium necklace with a suggested retail price of $29.95."

When informed that the offending cartoons were actually drawn by twelve different cartoonists and that his group might be on the hook for $12 million, Saeed didn't renege.   "We're going all in on the flop," he said.  "I'm sitting on a pile of these necklaces--I might as well use them."

Sharif Zahar, a used car dealer, offered a bounty of $17,000 plus a late model Sandstorm, an Arab knockoff of the Ford Explorer SUV.  "This baby's loaded," said Zahar.  "A/C, 8-track tape deck--the works."  The Peshawar businessman has built a chain of dealerships on the slogan "Our prices are fanatical!"

Peter Brooker, a professor of comparative religion at The Cooper Union in New York, said the mixture of religion and marketing was not unusual for Islam, which prohibits adherents from charging interest and regulates other business practices. 

"It was like a K-Mart Blue Light Special," he said.  "The muezzin came out on the minaret to lead the adhan to Friday service and said 'Attention faithful--for the next ten minutes assassins of infidel cartoonists will receive mail-in rebates on all houseware items except George Forman Whopper Grills.'"

The furor over the Danish cartoons has set off a world-wide wave of umbrage on the part of religious groups taking exception to comic strips.  Anabaptists in Boston today staged a demonstration at which they burned copies of "Family Circus", a King Features strip that has previously been considered one of the most innocuous in the business. 

"That strip is blasphemous," said Orel Olmstead, a spokesman for the sect.  "Jeffy and all those kids have obviously been baptized and attend church."  Anabaptists believe that only adults should practice religion. 

When informed that most of the world's major faiths permit religious observance by minors, Olmstead took a different tack.  "Fine--it's still not as funny as 'Marmaduke'."

Copyright 2006, Con Chapman