The gutted offices of Charlie Hebdo, Paris. Under Islamic law — not Islamist law — Molotov Cocktails replace letters to the editor.

The Daily Mail reports:

“Offices of French magazine torched after latest edition mocked Prophet [sic] Mohammed”

First, notice the religiously correct references to Mohammed. My old AP Stylebook recommends “Mohammed,” plain and simple, to denote “the founder of the of Islamic religion” — not “the Prophet Mohammed,” as the Daily Mail story calls him. This title is inflected with the obeisance of acceptance. (I note also that my old AP Stylebook recommends “Jesus,” not “the Son of God Jesus.”) The magazine, by the way, was commenting on the rising power and fortunes of sharia and its Islamic — not Islamist — proponents in Libya and Tunisia.

Here’s the “offending” cover via Vlad Tepes:

The story:

Molotov cocktails were today used to burn down the headquarters of a leading French magazine because it mocked the Prophet Mohammed [sic]. Arsonists struck shortly after 1am at the Paris offices of Charlie Hedbo, a Gallic version of Private Eye which prides itself on its mix of cutting satire and investigative journalism.

Its latest edition carries a cartoon image of a bearded Mohammed – something which is blasphemous under Islamic law – and pretends that it is being ‘guest edited’ by the Prophet.

It is accompanied by the slogan ‘100 lashes if you don’t die of laughter’, and the magazine is renamed ‘Sharia Hebdo’, after Sharia law.

Here is a short video clip that displays the “offending” magazine (the Daily Mail doesn’t dare, which means it is sharia-compliant).

A source at the magazine, based in Boulevard Davout in the city’s 20th arrondissement, said: ‘Molotov cocktail petrol bombs were used to attack the offices first thing this morning.

‘The attackers concentrated on the computer system, literally melting it. The offices were empty so nobody was injured, but thousands of euros worth of damage were caused.’

Charlie Hebdo’s editor-in-chief, a cartoonist known only as Charb, said: ‘We no longer have a newspaper. All our equipment has been destroyed or has melted.

‘We could not put a paper together today, but we will do everything possible to produce one next week.

‘Whatever happens, we’ll do it. There is no question of giving up.’The magazine’s website was also hacked, with messages appearing in English and Turkish denouncing its journalists for causing widespread offence.

Armed police were this morning surrounding the charred remains of the building, which is close to a number of housing estates where the occupants are predominantly Muslim.

Many regularly complain about discrimination in a country where racial and religious tensions often boil to the surface in riots.

Six years ago, Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard provoked anger across the Islamic world when he published 12 satirical images of the Prophet in a Danish newspaper.

The then editor of Charlie Hebdo was prosecuted in France for ‘insulting Muslims’ after he reproduced those images, but he was acquitted in 2007.

Despite this morning’s attack, the special edition of Charlie Hebdo was still on newsstands this morning, complete with an editorial ‘by the Prophet’ on Hallal drinks.

There were also features on ‘soft Sharia’, concentrating on the emergence of Islamic parties in Tunisia and Libya following the Arab Spring revolutions.

It also has a women’s section called ‘Sharia Madame’, which concentrates on Islamic veils, which were recently banned in France.

There are around six million Muslims living in France – the largest Muslim population in western Europe.

A Paris spokesman said there had been no arrests, but witnesses had seen the petrol bombs being thrown and two men fleeing the scene.