All is forgiven, says Charlie Hebdo as France pays tribute to victims
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WITH a printing press, medals of honor and ceremonies thousands of miles apart, France and Israel yesterday paid tribute to those killed in the Paris terrorist attacks. In Bulgaria, authorities said a Frenchman already under arrest had ties to the Paris gunmen who left 17 victims in their wake.
Defying the bloodshed and terror of last week, a caricature of the Prophet Muhammad appears on the cover of today’s edition of satirical newspaper Charlie Hebdo, weeping and holding a placard with the words “I am Charlie.” Above him is emblazoned: “All is forgiven” — a phrase one writer said meant to show that the survivors of the attacks forgave the gunmen.
With demand surging for the edition, the weekly planned to print up to 3 million copies, dwarfing its usual run of 60,000, after newsagents reported that large numbers of customers around the country were placing orders.
The new edition of Charlie Hebdo, known for its satirical attacks on Islam and other religions, will include other cartoons featuring the Prophet Mohammad and also making fun of politicians and other religions, its lawyer said.
“We will not back down, otherwise none of this has any meaning,” Richard Malka told French radio. “If you hold the banner ‘I am Charlie,’ that means you have the right to blaspheme, you have the right to criticise my religion.”
One newspaper vendor in central Paris said he had already received 200 advance orders for Charlie Hebdo and was stopping there as he could no longer cope.
There was no official reaction from the government on the weekly’s decision.
“I think that those who have been killed, if they were here, they would have been able to have a coffee today with the terrorists and just talk to them, ask them why they have done this,” columnist Zineb El Rhazoui told the BBC. “We feel, as Charlie Hebdo’s team, that we need to forgive the two terrorists who have killed our colleagues.”
Two masked gunmen opened the onslaught in Paris with a January 7 attack on the paper, singling out its editor and his police bodyguard for the first shots before killing 12 people in all. Ahmed Merabet, a French Muslim policeman, was one of the victims, killed as he lay wounded on the ground while the gunmen — brothers Said and Cherif Kouachi — made their escape.
Charlie Hebdo had received threats after depicting Muhammed before, and its offices were firebombed in 2011. Its editor, Stephane Charbonnier, was under constant guard. Its surviving staff say they have been working feverishly since the attacks in loaned office space to put out the latest issue.
France’s main Muslim organization yesterday called for calm, fearing that a new Muhammad cartoon could inflame passions anew.
At police headquarters in Paris, French President Francois Hollande paid separate tribute to the three police officers killed in the attacks, placing Legion of Honor medals on their caskets.
Hollande vowed that France will be “merciless in the face of anti-Semitic, anti-Muslims acts, and unrelenting against those who defend and carry out terrorism, notably the jihadists who go to Iraq and Syria.”
As Chopin’s funeral march played in central Paris and the caskets draped in French flags were led from the building, a procession began in Jerusalem for the four Jewish victims of Friday’s attack on a kosher supermarket in Paris.
Amid the hunt for accomplices, Bulgarian authorities said they have a Frenchman under arrest who is believed to have links to Cherif Kouachi.
Fritz-Joly Joachin, 29, was arrested January 1 as he tried to cross into Turkey.
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