The French satirical newspaper whose Paris offices were attacked in 2015 is reprinting controversial cartoons of Islam’s Prophet Muhammad that gunmen who opened fire on its newsroom cited as their motivation.
The move was announced Tuesday, a day before 13 men and a woman accused of providing weapons and logistics to the attackers go to trial on terrorism charges Wednesday.
In an editorial this week accompanying the offending cartoons, the newspaper said the drawings “belong to history, and history cannot be rewritten or erased.”
The January 2015 attacks on Charlie Hebdo and, two days later, a kosher supermarket, triggered a wave of killings claimed by the armed group ISIL (ISIS) across Europe.
Seventeen people were killed in the attacks, 12 of them in the editorial offices, along with the three attackers.
The attackers, brothers Cherif and Said Kouachi, claimed their attack on the newspaper on behalf of al-Qaeda. When they left the scene in Charlie Hebdo, they killed a wounded police officer and left.
Two days later, a prison acquaintance broke into a kosher supermarket on the eve of the Jewish Sabbath, claiming loyalty to ISIL. Four hostages died during the attack.
|
Why do the images of the prophet offend Muslims? |
By then, the Kouachi brothers had taken refuge in a printing press with another hostage. All three attackers were killed in almost simultaneous police raids.
The supermarket shooter, Amedy Coulibaly, also killed a young policewoman.
Blasphemy
Some will view the decision to republish the cartoons as a defiant gesture in defense of freedom of expression. But others may see it as yet another tease from a post that has long sparked controversy with its satirical attacks on religion.
The cartoons reissued this week were first printed in 2006 by Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten, sparking sometimes violent protests from some Muslims who found the depictions offensive.
The Prophet Muhammad is deeply revered by Muslims and any type of visual representation is prohibited. The cartoons were perceived to link him to terrorism.
Charlie Hebdo, infamous for his irreverence and accused by critics of racism, regularly caricatures religious leaders of various faiths and reposts them shortly after.
The newspaper’s offices in Paris were bombed in 2011 and its editorial leadership was placed under police protection, which remains in place to this day.
‘Ignore’
Laurent Sourisseau, editor of the newspaper and one of the few staff members who survived the attack, named each of the victims in a foreword to this week’s issue.
|
Charlie Hebdo Suspects Search As France Mourns Victims |
“It is rare those who, five years later, dare to oppose the demands that remain so urgent from religions in general, and some in particular,” wrote Sourisseau, also known as Riss.
The president of the French Council of Muslim Worship (CFCM), Mohammed Moussaoui, urged people to “ignore” the cartoons, while condemning the violence.
The suspects, who are going to trial starting at 08:00 GMT Wednesday, are accused of providing varying degrees of logistical support to the killers.
The trial was delayed for several months and most French courts closed due to the coronavirus epidemic.
The Paris court will meet until November 10 and, for the first time in a terrorism trial, the proceedings will be filmed for archival purposes given the public interest.
The national anti-terrorist prosecutor Jean-Francois Ricard dismissed the idea that it was only “little assistants” who were going to be tried, since the three armed men were dead.
.
