Special issue of Charlie Hebdo with God as terrorist on sale
God as a Murderer: One year after the Islamist terrorist attack on its editorial office, Charlie Hebdo has published a special edition with a provocative cover. It shows a blood-stained God running away with a Kalashnikov.
The headline reads: "One year on: The murderer is still on the run". The Vatican criticized the front page of the weekly newspaper, which went on sale in a large print run on Wednesday. "At Charlie, we are questioning the very idea of God," Charlie Hebdo boss Riss told the AFP news agency, referring to the front page. "Expressing things clearly makes people think. You have to shake people up a bit, otherwise they will always stay in the same rut." "Charlie has to be where the others don't dare to go," said Riss, who himself was seriously injured in the attack on January 7, 2015. "Charlie has always been a newspaper of struggle, but a funny, crazy struggle."
The Last Supper
In the 32-page special edition, which hit the newsstands with a print run of one million, the cartoonists and journalists of Charlie Hebdo take a look at the Attack on January 7 one. In one caricature, the Charlie Hebdo editorial team is drawn like in Leonardo da Vinci's famous "Last Supper" painting. Charb, who was killed in the attack, takes the place of Jesus and says: "In truth, I tell you, we'll be laughing our heads off together for a long time to come." Celebrities such as actresses Juliette Binoche and Isabelle Adjani expressed their solidarity with the satirical newspaper in articles. Older cartoons by Charb and the other cartoonists killed in the attack, Cabu, Honoré, Tignous and Wolinski, were also printed. "We think about them all the time," said Riss. However, there was no rush on the newsstands like there was for the issue that was published a week after the attack. At that time, almost eight million copies had been sold, a record in French press history.
"Genuine blasphemy"
The Vatican newspaper Osservatore Romano criticized in a commentary that Charlie Hebdo's front page offended the feelings of believers regardless of their religion. Behind the "deceptive banner of uncompromising secularism", the satirical newspaper once again forgets that religious leaders, regardless of their faith, repeatedly call for violence to be condemned in the name of religion. "Using God to justify hatred is real blasphemy, as Pope Francis has said several times." The heavily armed Islamists Said and Chérif Kouachi killed twelve people in the attack on the editorial office of the satirical newspaper known for its Muhammad cartoons. In the following two days, an acquaintance of the attackers shot dead a municipal policewoman and four other people during a hostage-taking in a Jewish supermarket. (SDA)
