November 9, 2011

VIDEO: Charlie Hebdo today … Libération tomorrow?

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Al Jazeera English covered the bombing last week of the offices of the satirical French weekly magazine, Charlie Hebdo. Fingers are pointing to Islamic radicals, since the paper recently published an issue where the prophet Muhammad was listed as the guest editor, though the cartoonist Luz sagely wrote, “Let’s be cautious. There’s every reason to believe it’s the work of fundamentalists, but it could just as well be the work of two drunks.”

In the Guardian, Kim Willsher writes that the weekly magazine remains incorrigible — its latest issue features a Muslim man kissing a bespectacled, pencil-pushing male Hebdo cartoonist on the mouth. (Actually, they’re slobbering all over each other, which we hope doesn’t reinforce stereotypes about dorky cartoonists being bad kissers.) Our favorite issue was back in 2006, when the front page depicted a forlorn Muhammad saying “C’est dur d’être aimé par des cons” (it’s hard to be loved by assholes). Needless to say, a slew of copies were sold.

Hours after an attack on the office a group of Turkish hackers called Akincilar posted a message on Hebdo‘s website, writing, “We Will Be Your Curse on Cyber World!” A precocious 20-year-old representative of Akincilar told France 24 that “If Libération continues publishing those cartoons, then we’ll have to deal with them as well.”

Al Jazeera’s video of the wreckage at Hebdo is below. Let’s hope Libération, which is currently housing Hebdo, remains safe.

MobyLives