JEDDAH, 9 October 2006 — Jordan and Iran yesterday denounced a video lampooning the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) produced by a far-right Danish party as British Muslims reported a surge of hate mail after a former minister asked Muslim women to remove their face veils.

“Muslims must be rational in their reaction to these offenses,” Jordanian Religious Affairs Minister Abdel Fattah Salah said in a statement published by the independent Jordanian daily Al-Ghad.

Denmark’s TV2 channel last month broadcast excerpts from a video made by members of the extreme-right Danish People’s Party showing activists of the party’s youth wing mocking the Prophet during a summer camp.

“Muslims must react to the international political and diplomatic fronts to put an end to such offenses against Islam and Muslim symbols,” Salah said. “The best answer to such offenses is to be more attached to our religion,” he added.

The publication in September 2005 of 12 caricatures of the Prophet by the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten sparked outrage and weeks of violent protests across the world.

In Tehran, Foreign Ministry spokesman Mohammad-Ali Hosseini told reporters that Iran will take up the issue through diplomatic channels and “convey our protest to Denmark.”

The Iranian Embassy in Copenhagen harshly condemned the Danish government for screening blasphemous video clips against Islam and the Prophet Muhammad. “It is deplorable that the extremist elements in the Danish society have attempted to sabotage Denmark’s relations with the Islamic countries once again,” the Iranian Embassy said.

The criticisms were voiced as Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen himself denounced the video footage. “I strongly condemn the behavior of members of the youth wing of the Danish Peoples’ Party during their summer camp,” Rasmussen said in a written statement to the Danish news agency Ritzau.

“It is unacceptable behavior of a small group of young people. Their tasteless behavior in no way represents the Danish people’s or young Danes’ view of Muslims or Islam,” Rasmussen said.

Police in the northwest English city of Liverpool reported meanwhile that a Muslim woman’s veil was torn from her face on Saturday after she was subjected to racial abuse. A spokesman for the Muslim Safety Forum (MSF), Muhammad Abul Kalam, said attacks and threats against Muslims have risen since Jack Straw, leader of the House of Commons and former foreign minister, made his remarks Thursday. Straw said he asks Muslim women to remove their face veils when they visit his constituency office.

“We are very much concerned that Jack Straw’s comments will be picked up by certain elements of the community who want to spread Islamophobia,” Abul Kalam said.

“There have already been a number of violent, intimidating attacks across the country. His statements have been really detrimental to the Muslim community,” he said.