French satirical newspaper firebombed after prophet Mohammed announcementRead the rest of the Daily Telegraph article HERE.
The offices of French satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo have been destroyed by a petrol bomb, a day after it named the Prophet Mohammed as its “editor-in-chief” for this week’s issue.
The fiercely anti-clerical magazine said the move, which included renaming the publication “Sharia Hebdo”, was intended to "celebrate" the victory of Islamist party Ennhada in Tunisia's election.
Charlie Hedbo's editor-in-chief, known as Charb, told France Info radio: "We no longer have a newspaper. All our equipment has been destroyed or has melted."
No injuries have been reported[.]
A single Molotov cocktail was thrown at the offices of Charlie Hebdo in Paris’s 20th arrondissement at around 1am. The ensuing fire was rapidly put out, but a large amount of material in the office was destroyed, police said.
“We cannot, today, put together a paper,” said Charb. “But we will do everything possible to do one next week. Whatever happens, we’ll do it. There is no question of giving in,” he said, adding that the magazine is filing a legal complaint against persons unkown.
According to Europe 1 radio, police are searching for two suspects seen near the scene.
Charlie Hebdo's website has also been hacked with a message in English and Turkish cursing the magazine.
The message said: "You keep abusing Islam's almighty Prophet with disgusting and disgraceful cartoons using excuses of freedom of speech.
"Be God's curse upon you!"
Editor Charb said the attackers could not even have read the offending magazine.
"The arsonists haven't read this paper, nobody knows what's in the paper except those who buy it this morning. People are reacting violently to a paper without knowing anything of its contents, that's what's most abhorrent and stupid," he told BFM TV.
The publication, historically famous for pillorying Catholic clericalism, was criticised by Muslims in 2007 after reprinting the Danish cartoons of the prophet Mohammad that caused outrage around the Islamic world....
Video of Hebdo's full response adds the following to the above beginning at 0:18:
"What we're doing is nothing like the polemical tone of the muhammad cartoons. We're approaching this with our own sense of humor"
Charles Hebdo is a fool if he thinks his brand of humor is any different from the Danish Cartoon to Islam. His full response is a good representation of twisted French logic when dealing with Islam.