Westergaard to Sell Mohammed Cartoon

Hey, may as well cash in for all the grief he's endured. Still, imagine the psychotic rage from the Islamists once the bidding goes off.

A DANISH cartoonist whose drawing of the Prophet Muhammad sparked riots across the Muslim world wants to sell the original drawing “to make something out of a difficult situation”.

The small, ink cartoon is locked in a bank vault as Kurt Westergaard, 72, hides from Islamic militants who have vowed to kill him. The threats have made his life miserable but he puts a brave face on his plight.

“At my age,” he said from his police safe house last week, “you are not so much afraid any more.”

His drawing, featuring a bomb in the prophet’s turban, is by far the most famous of a dozen “Muhammad cartoons” published three years ago by Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper Westergaard works for.

It could command great interest at auction. Auction houses, however, were voicing doubts about the wisdom of putting such a controversial item on sale.

Of course, they'll voices doubts. Because they're scared shitless of the Islamist goonsquads.

“It’s too hot to handle,” said Franck Lombrail, an auctioneer in Paris. “It would represent a risk for the public at the sale,” he added.

Flemming Rose, cultural editor of the Jyllands-Posten, called the cartoon “a great cultural icon of the 21st century”, and thought it was only fair for Westergaard to make money out of it. Rose said that on a visit to America last year he had autographed posters of the cartoon collection, which had sold for £500 each.

Westergaard has been moving from one safe house to the next with his wife, a retired kindergarten teacher, since police foiled a plot to behead him in his home in November. Several Danish newspapers recently reprinted the drawing in solidarity with him, prompting fresh protests.

Fresh protests? They haven't stopped protesting for three years already.

Anyway, if auction houses are too scared to get involved, there's always the Internet.

One option might be to put the cartoon up for sale on the internet. A less well-known Muhammad cartoon went for £1,500 in an internet auction. Already Westergaard has had offers: on Tuesday, he received a letter from Martin McNally, who is serving life in America for hijacking an aircraft in 1972, offering to buy the cartoon.

“What is he planning to do with it?” asked Westergaard, an affable figure with a wry sense of humour. “Will he hang it up in his cell?”

Westergaard hopes that the cartoon is worth more than the £2,500 suggested by McNally. His wife, meanwhile, has proposed selling all of the Muhammad cartoons for £50,000 to “a rich Arabian oil sheikh” who could then burn them in Mecca. The cartoonists would get half of the money. The rest would be donated to needy Muslims.

“She thinks that is the best way of getting out of it,” said Westergaard, chuckling.

He seems resigned to a life on the run. “This will go on for the rest of my life, I am sure,” he said. “There is no way out.”

Dutch film wins award at Egyptian Film Festival

Well, not the one by Geert Wilders, that;s for sure, but still a Dutch film won an award at The International Cairo Film Festival

The International Cairo Film Festival jury awarded a children's short, "Doggie" the Golden Cairo for Short Features, less than two weeks after banning Dutch entries because of far-right politician Geert Wilders' film, which portrays the Koran as a "fascist book."

I don't have a clue what the film is about and the rest of the story just delves into the "Fitna" controversy and makes mention of the arrest of two suspects who apparentely planning to kill the cartoonist Kurt Westergaard.

Westergaard to Dutch: Show the Wilders Film Or Commit Political Suicide

You've really got to admire Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard. He started the whole Mohammad cartoon dustup which still has the practitioners of peace burning things every Friday, and today he ups the ante by telling Dutch politicians to man up and show the Geert Wilders film Fitna.

Westergaard has a set of stones on him and should be a role model for politicians of all stripes in the Western world. Too bad most of them are feckless, craven wimps.

The Danish cartoonist behind controversial images of the Prophet Mohammad has urged a Dutch right-wing politician to broadcast a film expected to be critical of the Koran despite fears it might spark violence.

Kurt Westergaard is the author of a series of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed including one showing him with a bomb as a turban which triggered riots in the Muslim world and a boycott of Danish products when they were published in 2006.

Fearing a similar backlash against the Netherlands, the Dutch government has urged politician Geert Wilders not to broadcast a film he has made about the Koran, distancing itself from his views and considering a possible ban.

Westergaard told the Dutch Volkskrant daily on Monday no Danish politician would dare to suggest blocking the film.

"That would mean political suicide. A Danish politician knows that you should not limit freedom of expression. Wilders must just show his film," he said in an interview.

Wilders has given few details about his film, but he has called the Koran a "fascist" book that incites violence. Nobody except Wilders and his producers have actually seen the film.

Wilders said last week he was disappointed that no Dutch broadcaster wanted to show the movie but said he would probably launch it on March 28 at the parliament's press centre in The Hague and make it available on a special Web site.

In the latest protest against the Wilders film and the reprinting of the Prophet Mohammad cartoon, thousands of Afghan students burned Danish and Dutch flags on Sunday and threatened attacks on their troops serving with NATO in Afghanistan.

The cartoon was republished by a number of Danish papers last month to show solidarity with Westergaard after three men were arrested on suspicion of plotting to kill him.

Westergaard, who said he is about to move to a sixth hiding place and expects to need protection for the rest of his life, said he did not regret drawing the cartoons.

"In Denmark we have criticism of everything: the Queen, politicians, religion ... provoking debate is the job of the newspaper and so also of the cartoonist. Muslims have to accept that," he said.

I get the feeling Westergaard isn't going to back down.

Thanks to Hot Air for the links.

Offend Muslim Fanatics, Wind Up Homeless

Surely all those guardians of free speech out there will be willing to open their doors to this man, won't they?

Two years ago Kurt Westergaard was in his Copenhagen home drawing pictures. One of them was of the Muslim prophet, Muhammad. Now Westergaard is homeless.

Draw a picture offensive to Muslim extremists, and you might find yourself without a roof. Ask Kurt Westergaard, one of the twelve Danish cartoonists whose autumn 2005 Muhammad caricatures lead to violent protests throughout the Muslim world. He was booted from his police-protected hotel room on Feb. 15 for being "too much of a security risk." And now the 73-year-old cartoonist and his wife are without a place to live.

Westergaard was forced to leave his actual residence in November after the Danish security and intelligence agency, PET, informed him of a "concrete" plan to murder him, according to the paper that originally published the cartoons, Jyllands-Posten. Westergaard and his wife have been living under police protection since.

PET had been gathering information about the plot for several months, leading to a Feb. 12 raid (more...) carried out in the western Danish city of Aarhus. Five suspects -- "people with a Muslim background," with both Danish and foreign citizenship -- were taken into custody. The Associated Press quoted PET as stating that the raids were intended "to prevent a terror-related murder...[and to do so] at an early phase to stop the planning."

In response to last week's arrest, a number of Danish newspapers republished the original cartoons the following day (more...). Among those reprinted, of course, was Westergaard's caricature: Muhammad with a lit bomb in his turban. "We are doing this to document what is at stake in this case," the Copenhagen paper Berlingske Tidende wrote, "and to unambiguously back and support the freedom of speech that we as a newspaper will always defend."

Any of those limousine liberals at the New York Times willing to put him and his family up?

I didn't think so.

Maybe the next time Prophet Obama gives one of his hour-long stemwinders he can mention the intolerance of Muslim fanatics.

Speaking of Muslim fanatics, the unindicted Hamas co-conspirators from CAIR are at it again, trying to silence a great voice of freedom.

Bashman says bring it on.

More at Gateway Pundit.

Update: Allahpundit has some thoughts on Westergaard.

Dreaded Cartoons of Blasphemy Murder Plot

You ever get the feeling these psychopaths won't rest until they "avenge" the dreaded Mohammed cartoons of blasphemy?

Neither do I.

Danish police said Tuesday they have arrested three people suspected of plotting to kill one of the 12 cartoonists behind the Prophet Muhammad drawings that sparked a deadly uproar in the Muslim world two years ago.

Two Tunisians and a Dane of Moroccan origin were arrested in pre-dawn raids in western Denmark, the police intelligence agency said.

The Dane was suspected of violating Danish terror laws but likely would be released after questioning as the investigation continues, said Jakob Scharf, the head of the PET intelligence service. The two Tunisians would be expelled from Denmark, he said.

Just great. I'm sure they'll learn their lesson and become nice law-abiding citizens.

The agency did it [sic] mention which cartoonist was targeted. However, according to Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper that first published the drawings on Sept. 30, 2005, the suspects were planning to kill its cartoonist Kurt Westergaard.

"There were very concrete murder plans against Kurt Westergaard," said Carsten Juste, the paper's editor-in-chief.

The cartoons were later reprinted by a range of Western publications, and they sparked deadly protests in parts of the Muslim world.

Islamic law generally opposes any depiction of the prophet, even favorable, for fear it could lead to idolatry.

Westergaard, 73, and his wife Gitte, 66, had been living under police protection, Jyllands-Posten reported.

"Of course I fear for my life when the police intelligence service say that some people have concrete plans to kill me. But I have turned fear into anger and resentment," Westergaard said in a statement published on Jyllands-Posten's Web site.

PET, the police intelligence service, called the action "preventive," saying it decided to strike "at an early phase to stop the planning and the carrying out of the murder."

In the uproar that followed the publishing of the cartoons, Danes watched in disbelief as angry mobs burned the Danish flag and attacked the country's embassies in Muslim countries including Syria, Iran and Lebanon.

It was more like orchestrated outrage that followed many months later. But why quibble with the facts?

Jyllands-Posten was evacuated several times because of threats and posted security guards at its office outside Aarhus and in Copenhagen.

The paper initially refused to apologize for the cartoons, which it said were published in reaction to a perceived self-censorship among artists dealing with Islamic issues, but later said it regretted that the cartoons had offended Muslims.

Our very existence offends them.

Update: More at Hot Air, Jawa Report.