06 January 2017

‘Most protected woman’ in France quits satirical magazine for going soft on Muslim extremists

Zineb El Rhazoui, the ‘most protected woman’ in France, said she’s resigning from her job at Charlie Hebdo, the controversial satirical magazine that was targeted by Muslim extremists in a shooting rampage two years ago.

Speaking with Agence-France Presse, El Rhazoui suggested the notoriously irreverent and defiant magazine has gone soft on extremists and actually succumbed to their demands that an image of the prophet Mohammed should never be depicted.

“Charlie Hebdo died on January 7 [2015],” El Rhazoui said in the interview, referring to the shooting massacre that left 12 dead, including nine of her Hebdo colleagues. She happened to be out of the office the day the Islamist gunmen burst into the Paris offices with assault rifles and began firing.

“Freedom at any cost is what I loved about Charlie Hebdo, where I worked through great adversity,” she said, adding that the jihadists may as well be editing the magazine now, ensuring “that Mohammed is no longer depicted.” [NYTimes.com] Read more