The first death in riots sparked by the controversy about cartoons initially published in Denmark and reproduced by major european media outlets might finally help the US government concentrate on the real issue - the manipulation of the "arab street" by undemocratic regime.
You'd think the promoters of the democratization of the Middle-East would be able to spot those maneuvers easily. Not so. The first reaction from the State Department was more in line with a government that, after all, invokes God as a rationale for its action and occasionally protests a cartoon.
The debate was couched in familiar terms: freedom of expression versus respect for religion or,worse, as a "clash of civilizations"... as if the Christian conservatives had not protested depictions of their religion in the Western media. What is different, obviously, is that those protesters do not call for the death of cartoonists or editors, nor suggest boycotting entire nations because they object to the actions of some of its citizen.
The real issue, in this crisis artificially incited four months after the drawings were first published, would be to understand how and why the spiral of hatred was unleashed.
Who are the zealots that went on tour in the arab world and added extreemly offensive cartoons to the 12 original ones? Who were their relays, in Saudi Arabia and Syria? How unusual is the gesture of the Saudi publications that printed the cartoons - resulting in the condemnation of one of the publishers? And what is the purpose of this agitation targeting mostly European interests, at this time, in Syria, Lebanon and Palestine?
That a part of the arab populations can be whipped into a frenzy at the drop of a turban should not surprise anyone. The only pertinent question should be: why now?