Newsweek Issue Banned for Depicting Mohammed

The BBC reports that several Muslim countries have banned the latest issue of Newsweek because the magazine includes a depiction of Mohammed. The illustration comes from a Turkish manuscript that shows Mohammed and the angel Gabriel. Time apologized last April for running the same image, depicted below.

Most Muslims believe that the Koran strictly forbids visual depictions of Mohammed So far, Bangladesh, Indonesia, and Malaysia have banned the issue, while Egypt has condemened it has blasphemous.

The BBC reports that Reporters Sans Frontiers condemned the bans as blatant acts of censorship. In a press release, that group said, “Aware that the representation of Muslim prophets is forbidden, we nevertheless consider that the censorship of this international magazine is in the first place an attack on the free flow of information.”

Not that such censorship is exactly a surprise in either of those four countries.

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