1:59 video

Cairo rioters surrounding US Embassy carrying black flag. The round circle represents the personal seal of Mohammed (used in correspondence with foreign leaders) and is a standard feature found in al Qaeda flags.

Charles C.W. Cooke delivers a history lesson on the negative symbolism of black flags.

‘Every normal man,” wrote H. L. Mencken, “must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin to slit throats.” Given that his subject was modern poetry, he can be forgiven the impulse. But we might politely decline to join him. There are few occasions on which the raising of a black flag has been an overture to something pretty, and a great many on which it has augured something ill. Black flags are harbingers of chaos.

The recent events in the Arab world are no exception. The barbarism in Egypt and Libya pushed back into view the nefarious purposes to which black flags are most commonly deployed. Having scaled the walls of the American embassy compound in Cairo on September 11, protesters ripped down Old Glory, set fire to it, and managed to replace it temporarily with their own pennant. At the consulate in Benghazi, marauders put up their flag, murdered the ambassador and three other Americans, and caused as much damage as they could. The unrest has not yet stopped, with U.S. citizens and property being targeted in Lebanon, Yemen, Tunisia, and Syria.

Read the whole thing.

Wikipedia on Islamic flags.

Wikipedia on the Islamic Black Flag.

Captions: “Believer wounded by the unbelievers.” — “Unbeliever wounded by the believers.”

From Hara-Kiri, journal bête et méchant via Jose Guardia (on FB).

Captions: “Untouchables 2 — Must Not Mock”

The French satire magazine Charlie Hebdo again has published some cartoon images mocking Islamic religious hypersensitivity, as the Australian Herald Sun reported:

The cover of Charlie Hebdo today shows a Muslim in a wheelchair being pushed by an Orthodox Jew under the title Intouchables 2, referring to an award-winning French film about a poor black man who helps an aristocratic quadriplegic.

Another cartoon on the back page of the weekly magazine shows a naked turbaned Mohammed exposing his posterior to a film director, a scene inspired by a 1963 film starring French film star Brigitte Bardot.

Charlie Hebdo’s website crashed today after being bombarded with comments that ranged from hate mail to approbation.

The magazine is no stranger to controversy over issues relating to Islam.

Last year it published an edition ”guest-edited” by Prophet Mohammed that it called Sharia Hebdo.

The magazine’s offices in Paris were subsequently fire-bombed.

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The government of France responded bravely by announcing the closing of twenty embassies all over the Islamic world.

France 24:

France announced Wednesday it will close 20 embassies across the Muslim world on Friday after French weekly Charlie Hebdo published cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed naked, amid growing unrest over an anti-Islamic film that has left dozens dead.

The French foreign ministry announced Wednesday that France will close 20 of its embassies in Muslim countries this Friday following the publication of controversial Prophet Mohammed cartoons by satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo. Major protests in the Muslim world generally take place after Friday prayers.

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Charlie Hebdo’s web-site was successfully shut down by denial of service attacks, and its offices were today surrounded by French riot police.

Daily Mail

Captions: top: “The film which embarrassed the Muslim world.” Mohammed says: “And my buttocks. Do you like my buttocks?” below: “Mohammed a star is born!”

The Daily Mail publishes evidence that the order of the universe is not necessarily on the side of fundamentalist Muslim demonstrators.

A Pakistani protestor has died after inhaling smoke from burning U.S. flags during a rally against the anti-Islam film Innocence of Muslims.

Abdullah Ismail died in Mayo hospital in Lahore having complained of feeling unwell during the angry demonstrations in the eastern Pakistan city yesterday.

Around 10,000 people are estimated to have taken part in the protest organised by the group Tehreek Hurmat-i-Rasool.

Hat tip to Iowahawk (via FB).

Video uploaded to YouTube by Abdalgader Fadl shows the body of the dead or unconscious American Ambassador Ambassador Christopher Stevens being dragged out of a window of the consulate in Benghazi, Libya. It doesn’t look to me like the mob, ullulating in triumph and snapping photos with camera phones, is engaged in taking Mr. Stevens to the hospital, as some commenters here have previously contended.

Hat tip to Breitbart

LA Times:

Just after midnight Saturday morning, authorities descended on the Cerritos home of the man believed to be the filmmaker behind the anti-Muslim movie that has sparked protests and rioting in the Muslim world.

Los Angeles County sheriff’s deputies escorted a man believed to be Nakoula Basseley Nakoula to an awaiting car. The man declined to answer questions on his way out and wore a hat and a scarf over his face. He kept his hands in the pockets of a winter coat.

Sheriff’s officials could not be reached by The Times, but department spokesman Steve Whitmore told KNBC News that deputies assisting the federal probation department took Nakoula to the sheriff’s substation in Cerritos for interviewing.

[Updated at 1:40 a.m. July 15, 2012: Whitmore told The Times that Nakoula was taken in for a voluntary interview with probation officials and has not been arrested or detained.]

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His many thousands of regular readers undoubtedly recognize that Glenn Reynolds is a harmless and mild-mannered intellectual guy with the classic range of nerdy interests, whose characteristic response to the insanities and outrages he notes in the course of his blogging is a sharp witticism.

Early yesterday evening, the seismic recorders in the neighborhood of Knoxville, Tennessee undoubtedly jumped alarmingly, as Professor Reynolds underwent a highly uncharacteristic meltdown of pure, white hot indignation at the news story above reporting that the obscure individual reputedly associated with the 13:51 “Innocence of Muslims” video had been hauled off for questioning in the middle of the night by a small army of law enforcement officers, acting under what was obviously the most questionable kind of authority in a country with Constitutionally-guaranteed free speech.

WHY BARACK OBAMA SHOULD RESIGN Reynolds furiously labeled his posting, which has been accreating additional commentary and bitter humor all day.

Example: Paul Crabtree writes: “Although the midnight raid to punish free speech is beyond deplorable, I guess we should be relieved that the Nobel Prize winner didn’t order a drone strike on his house.” Heh. We probably don’t have to worry about those . . . in the first term.

Glenn Reynolds & his associates instantly correctly penetrated the official malarkey. Under American law, there is no possible crime anyone could be charged with for creating and publishing a video satirizing Islam. Bassley Nakoula was dragged out of his home in the middle of the night by the local Los Angeles branch of the Gestapo for embarrassing the regime.

Muslims burn US flag in Bangladesh.

Ryan M, a contributor to Ricochet who is clearly a defense attorney or public defender, expressed the feelings of many Americans, fed up with both expressions of Muslim rage and with the futile efforts by American liberals at placating them. An increasing number of Americans are looking for leadership that will do something serious and effective about the festering fanatical pathology which periodically erupts into murderous violence.

Reading of the murder of Ambassador Stevens:

My immediate reaction was the thought that we, as a country, need to finally say enough, already, and squash the mob. My reaction upon reading a statement released by our own government was one that leads me to that emotionalism that typically finds no home in my little essays:

The Embassy of the United States in Cairo condemns the continuing efforts by misguided individuals to hurt the religious feelings of Muslims — as we condemn efforts to offend believers of all religions. Today, the 11th anniversary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States, Americans are honoring our patriots and those who serve our nation as the fitting response to the enemies of democracy. Respect for religious beliefs is a cornerstone of American democracy. We firmly reject the actions by those who abuse the universal right of free speech to hurt the religious beliefs of others.

Right now, I feel a bit more like the guy sitting on his porch with a shotgun. This isn’t a matter of hurting people’s feelings or being nice or taking responsibility for creating a situation where some people hate us. It isn’t a matter of cracking down on our own freedom of speech in order to silence anyone who would say something that might spark a riot. It is a matter of getting the message through that we will not tolerate that riot, for any reason. I am far more inclined to suggest that we send that message in the same way we told the Japanese that they needed to be finished with World War II. September 11 becomes far less symbolic for them when September 12 is the day that we wiped out an entire capital city in retaliation. I am not, obviously, suggesting that we drop a nuclear bomb on some Middle East capital in order to send a message. However, what we have done is precisely the opposite. We have given them exactly what they want. We have responded to unprovoked violence by promising to make an effort to dismantle the system that they don’t like. We have sent a message. That message: “Keep doing this. It is working.”

King John Sobieski and the military forces of Poland-Lithuania put a stop to Islamic aggression against Europe and Western Civilization for over three centuries.

How many people realize that the 9/11 attacks were deliberately timed to represent an Islamic response to the Relief of the Siege of Vienna?

Islamist mob with some members wearing Guy Fawkes masks storms US Embassy in Cairo to tear down US flag on September 11.

On September 11th, the anniversary of the murder of 3000 innocent US civilians by Islamist fanatics, Muslim mobs attacked American diplomatic facilities in Cairo and Benghazi.

In Cairo, the mob merely tore down and desecrated the American flag, but in Benghazi a local militia stormed and burned the US consulate and murdered four diplomatic personnel (and several, at least two, Marine guards defending them).

So what should an American president do?

I have a few suggestions for Mr. Obama.

1) Freeze all Libyan and Egyptian assets.

2) Cancel all aid to Libya and Egypt.

3) Announce rewards for delivery to US military authorities of mullahs and militia leaders responsible for the riots and all prominent participants.

4) Launch cruise missile attacks on several principal Islamicist sites, including mosques, militia headquarters, &c. in Benghazi and Cairo. In the selection of targets, err on the side of excess.

5) Demand reparations of $10 billion from Libya, $1 billion from Egypt. (Russia received a very large and historic diamond in compensation in 1829 from Persia after the murder of its ambassador by a similar mob.

5) Announce a US Naval and Air embargo on flights and shipping from both countries to be sustained until the perpetrators have been captured and delivered and reparations have been paid. Shoot down any attempted flights, sink any ships trying to enter or leave the territorial waters of Libya or Egypt.

6) The President should make a speech informing the Islamic world that the United States will no longer regard extremist groups committing outrages against Americans or citizens of other civilized nations as distinct and separate from the governments of the same Islamic states which harbor them, fail to prevent their actions, and whose citizens provide their funding. Henceforward, any attack by Islamic extremists on Americans or citizens of allied civilized nations will be avenged promptly and with the utmost severity by similar acts of war directed at the governments, civil populations, national properties, and in particular Islamic religious sites on such a scale as which will cause Muslims everywhere to rue the day they permitted those extremists to act in their name. We are strong, Muslims are weak, and we will in future no longer refrain from avenging our people.

Islamist mob parades the body of murdered US Ambassador Christopher Stevens in Benghazi.

A slightly enlarged version of this Google map of Benghazi identifies locations of mosques.

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CORRECTION, 9/13:

No Marines were killed, because evidently no Marines were present at the Benghazi Consulate to defend the ambassador. Politico.

Some commenters here have claimed that the photograph (which seems to have originated from a South Asian news source) shows Libyans trying to assist the ambassador. I think the photo image is indefinite. It isn’t clear whether Stevens is dead or barely alive, and the viewer cannot tell exactly what the men around him are doing. I simply quoted the original sources.

There are also reports today that Ambassador Stevens was raped by the mob before his death.

Dan Freedman has some data on the recent French election that most Americans had not realized.

This is from a friend in France:

Hello to my American friends,
As you know, the Socialist François Hollande won the presidential elections in France, last Sunday.
It is a catastrophe for France.
Hollande was elected by the Muslisms:
a survey (of 10,000 Muslims) shows that 93% of the Muslims voted for him.
As 2 million Muslims participated in this election, Hollande got 1,720,000 Muslim votes more than Sarkozy did: (0.93-0.07) x 2,000,000 = 1,720,000
But at the end, in the whole population, he got only 1,139,316 votes more than Sarkozy.
So, without the Muslims’ votes, Sarkozy would have been re-elected.
All the Muslim criminals feel now empowered.
Criminality is already on the rise (1,700 cars were burnt in France for the first night). Muslims are screaming anti-French and anti-Jews watchwords in our streets.
Veiled women, wearing the illegal burqa, are strolling in our streets.
And, as if this wasn’t enough, Hollande wants to give to all the foreigners the right to vote in our elections!!
France will face a very hard situation. We are heading for civil war in a few years.
That’s the last news from occupied France.

Maxime

What would Charles Martel think of this?

Hat tip to Douglas.