London is the Latest Site for Protests against Film Featuring Negative Depiction of Prophet Muhammad

Thousands of protestors made their anger known in London this week about YouTube’s (News - Alert) decision to keep an anti-Islamic film on the popular site.

Moslems worldwide have taken to the streets to condemn the way the movie portrays their prophet Muhammad.

Protestors this week gathered outside of Google's (News - Alert) London headquarters. More protests are likely globally – with Google offices being the likely target. 


Image via Shutterstock

The BBC placed the number of protestors at 3,500, while others estimated there were 10,000 people at the protest. Some of the banners at the rally read, “We love our prophet more than our lives” and “Prophet Muhammad is the founder of freedom of speech,” The Week reported.

The protesters want the trailer for “Innocence of Muslims,” to be removed from YouTube. Google refuses, and says the film is "clearly within our guidelines and so will stay on YouTube.” But in Libya, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia and India YouTube blocked access to the video.

"We work hard to create a community everyone can enjoy and which also enables people to express different opinions,” the BBC quoted a statement from YouTube. "This can be a challenge because what's OK in one country can be offensive elsewhere." Protests will likely continue.

"Our next protest will be at the offices of Google and YouTube across the world,” Masoud Alam, one of the organizers of the protest, said. “We are looking to ban this film. This is not freedom of expression, there is a limit for that. This insult of the Prophet will not be allowed."

The protest was organized by a group called the Muslim Action Forum. Alam warned that in the next few weeks there would be a "million strong" march in London's Hyde Park.

Anger over the film’s trailer played a role in protestors recently attacking Western embassies in Sudan, Egypt and Yemen. It remains unclear if the attack in the U.S. embassy in Benghazi, Libya, which led to the death of U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens, was tied to protests or acts of planned terrorism with the protests as a convenient cover.

Sheikh Faiz Al-Aqtab Siddiqui, told The Daily Telegraph, "Terrorism is not just people who kill human bodies, but who kill human feelings as well. The makers of this film have terrorized 1.6 billion people.”

Last month, Pakistan blocked nearly 753 links to the anti-Islamic film on YouTube. The decision to block the links was made by the nation’s Supreme Court.