I ran across a couple of mentions that there were “extra,” extra-offensive cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him, if that is the proper phrase). The sources were a little too tinfoil for me to quote and link verbatim, so I went looking around.
Wikipedia led me in the direction of the Danish newspaper that originally published a set of 12 cartoons – the originals are reproduced (in a very tiny format) on the Wiki page. If you really want to see them, you may… especially for comparison purposes.
The Danish paper has an English-language section on the Middle-East/Islamic cartoon flap”:
On 30 September last year, Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten published 12 different cartoonists’ idea of what the Prophet Mohammed might have looked like.
The initiative was taken as part of an ongoing public debate on freedom of expression, a freedom much cherished in Denmark.
In our opinion, the 12 drawings were sober. They were not intended to be offensive, nor were they at variance with Danish law, but they have indisputably offended many Muslims for which we apologize.Since then a number of offensive drawings have circulated in The Middle East which have never been published in Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten and which we would never have published, had they been offered to us. We would have refused to publish them on the grounds that they violated our ethical code.
Related articles (in English) at the Jyllends-Posten are here.
Wikipedia notes:
A Muslim religious organisation in Denmark, Islamisk Trossamfund, played a large part in bringing attention to the cartoons to Muslims of the Middle East during a recent tour; allegedly, it added three additional images to the group and claimed that they had been published in Jyllands-Posten as well.[58]
These three images are all considerably more obscene than the published cartoons, and none of them had previously been published by Jyllands-Posten or any other mainstream media outlet. On February 1 BBC World aired a story showing one of these three images, and incorrectly claimed that it had been published in Jyllands-Posten. [59]
Akhmad Akkari, spokesman of the Danish-based European Committee for Prophet Honouring[60] which co-organised the tour, claimed to be unaware of the origin of the three pictures and said that they had been sent by unknown persons to Muslims in Denmark. Arkkari purported to justify the use of the three drawings as providing “insight in how hateful the atmosphere in Denmark is towards Muslims.” However, when Akkari was asked if the Muslims who had received these pictures could be interviewed, Akkari refused to reveal their identities.[61]
The bracketed note numbers refer to footnoted links on the Wiki page. Keep in mind that Wikipedia can be edited by anyone with a login, although they have a large group of volunteer editors who mostly succeed in keeping it factual.
So – where did those 3 cartoons come from? Were they really sent anonymously to Muslim Danes? Or were they inserted to ginger up the rest of the collection? Admittedly, the image of the Prophet with the bomb in his turban is considered one of the most offensive, and it’s definitely one of the original cartoons.
The other question being batted around by the more… reality-challenged of the blogosphere is the mysterious availability of Danish flags to burn in a variety of Middle Eastern and South Asian countries. Who knows? It does seem surprisingly well-orchestrated, although it took several months to really heat up.