German Carnival Fun

Carnival attracts 3 million in Germany - Muslims offended.

A Muslim leader criticized a float in the city of Dusseldorf that satirically suggested Islam was not peaceful.

The float carried two identical cartoon-style papier-mache figures, each wearing a suicide-bomber’s belt and carrying a dagger and a pistol. The first was labelled ‘the cliche,’ the second was labelled ‘the reality.’

Both scowling figures were labelled ‘mullahs,’ a term used to describe both Shiite and Sunni clergy. The float was part of a carnival parade watched by more than half a million people in the western city of Dusseldorf.

‘This hasn’t got anything to do with humour,’ said Aiman A Mazyek, general secretary of the National Council of Muslims in Germany. ‘The message it gives me is: ‘We love our prejudices, we’ll stand up for them, even if they are flagrantly untrue.”However ‘as a born-and-bred Rhinelander, I wouldn’t get too upset about it,’ said Mazyek. ‘I’m sure most of the revellers don’t want to spread anti-Islam cynicism.