A Likeness of the Truth

"I prefer to die on my feet than to live on my knees."

            Coco is Corinne Rey's pen name. She's a cartoonist, a French cartoonist. It was 11:30 a.m on Wednesday, January 7, 2015. She was late for a 10:30 staff meeting at the Paris-based magazine where she was a contributor.

            She had just picked up her daughter from a nearby nursery school. She was taking her little girl to the meeting.

            Two young men stood at the locked outside door to the lobby. They wore black from head to toe. Black hoods covered their heads. Black masks hid their faces. They both had  Kalishnikovs—AK-47 Russian assault rifles. They wore bulletproof vests.

            The two al-Qaeda terrorists told the terrified Rey words to the following effect: "If you don't enter the security code that opens this door, we'll kill your little girl."

            Rey punched in the numbers. Upon entering the lobby, the terrorists shot and killed a maintenance man at the front desk.

            They dragged Rey and her little child upstairs. She flung herself under a desk and lay on top of her daughter.

            "Where is Charb?" the gunmen shouted (or words to that effect).

            They shot and killed him, firing at his head.

            Over the next five to 10 minutes, they blasted the offices, murdering another eight cartoonists, editors, and writers and wounding three others.

Police on bicycles

            By this time, police on bicycles had arrived outside, probably unaware of exactly what was happening. The terrorists killed two of the officers. One who they injured lay on the sidewalk begging for mercy. A terrorist stood above him and shot him dead. Other police officers were also injured.

            Who was Charb? Charb's full name was Stephane Carbonnier. He was 47. He was an atheist with Communist sympathies. His courage knew no bounds.

            He was a cartoonist and editorial director of 'Charlie Hebdo,' a French satirical magazine. His long-running comic strip Maurice et Patapon featured Maurice, a left-wing bisexual man, and Patapon, a conservative cat.

            For years he and his little magazine (It only had a circulation of about 50,000) delighted in making fun of everyone and everything. It once called Buddhism "the most stupid religion ever." It ran a cartoon of Pope Benedict XVI in Nazi regalia. (As a teenager, he had to enroll in the Hitler Youth. It was mandatory, even though he was a seminary student.)

            In 2006 Charlie Hebdo republished Dutch cartoons of Muhammad, the prophet of Islam. The Qur'an says nothing on the issue of depictions of Muhammad. He was often painted in Islam's first centuries. Today, however, most Muslims disapprove of this. Radical Muslim terrorists use violence to enforce this custom as part of their strategy to subjugate non-Muslims.

            "We publish caricatures every week, but people only describe them as declarations of war when it's about the person of the prophet or radical Islam," Charb said in 2012. "When you start saying that you can't create such drawings, then the same thing will apply to other, more harmless representations."

            Over the years Charb's magazine had run several of his cartoons, often on its covers, satirizing Muhammad and Islam. A 2006 cover (below) shows Muhammad weeping below the headline "Muhammad overwhelmed by fundamentalists." A 2011 cover emblazoned with another cartoon of Muhammad had headline "100 lashes if you don't die of laughter." A second 2011 cover cartoon showed Muhammad kissing a man. The caption? "Love is stronger than hate."

No concealed carry permit

            "Muhammad isn't sacred to me," said Charb. "I don't blame Muslims for not laughing at our drawings. I live under French law. I don't live under Qur'anic law."

            In response to the cartoons and such statements, al-Qaeda in 2011 firebombed Charlie Hebdo's offices. After that, Charb lived under police guard. French police denied his application for a permit to carry a concealed handgun.

            Al-Qaeda also put him on its "Wanted: Dead or Alive" list. That list includes the Somali activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali who has denounced Muslim oppression of women; the Texan Molly Norris who founded "Draw Mohammed Day" (She now lives in hiding); and novelist Salman Rushdie.

            "I've got no kids, no wife, no car, no credit cards," said Charb. "Perhaps what I'm going to say sounds a bit pompous, but I prefer to die on my feet than to live on my knees."

            Two days before Charb was murdered he completed an 82-page manifesto on Islamphobia titled "Open Letter: On Blasphemy, Islamophobia, and the True Enemies of Free Expression." His murder came the day before Charlie Hebdo was to publish an issue titled 'Sharia Hebdo' in which Muhammad served as its mock "editor."

            "It should be as normal to criticize Islam as it is to criticize Jews or Catholics," said Charb. "Do we want to live in fear and terror and practice self-censorship?"

            In response to the murders, French prime minister Francois Fillon said, "Freedom of expression is an inalienable right in our democracy and all attacks on the freedom of the press must be condemned with the greatest firmness. No cause can justify such an act of violence."

            British Prime Minister David Cameron agreed, saying, "We stand united with the French people in our opposition to all forms of terrorism and stand squarely for free speech and democracy."

            The others who died that day were:

Frederic Boisseau, 42, maintenance worker

Franck Brinsolaro, 49, police officer

Elsa Cayat, 54, psychiatrist and columnist

Jean Cabut, 76, cartoonist

Philippe Honore, 73, cartoonist

Clarissa Jean-Philippe, 26, police officer

Bernard Maris, 68, economist and journalist

Ahmed Merabet, 40, police officer

Mustapha Ourrad, 60, proofreader

Michel Renaud, 69, travel industry figure and journalist

Bernard Verlhac, 57, cartoonist

Georges Wolinski, 80, cartoonist

MORAL: Stand up for what you believe.

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