Middle East, Anti-islam Film | featured news

An Egyptian court convicted in absentia Wednesday seven Egyptian Coptic Christians and a Florida-based American pastor, sentencing them to death on charges linked to an anti-Islam film that had sparked riots in parts of the Muslim world.

Al Qaeda leader Ayman al-Zawahiri said a film made in the United States mocking the Prophet Mohammad showed Washington was waging a "crusader Zionist war" against Muslims and he called for more protests outside American embassies.

After recent violent events in the Middle East and North Africa, travelers booked on a Nile cruise or a grand tour of Morocco might experience a knee-jerk reaction: Cancel and go to Disney World instead.

Protests by tens of thousands of Pakistanis infuriated by an anti-Islam film descended into deadly violence on Friday, with police firing tear gas and live ammunition in an attempt to subdue rioters who hurled rocks and set fire to buildings in some cities.

The White House is now describing the Sept. 11 attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazias a “terrorist attack,” a shift in emphasis after days of describing the lethal assault as a spontaneous eruption of anger over an anti-Islamic film made in California.

An actress who appears in a clip of an anti-Muslim film blamed for causing deadly violence in the Middle East says she will continue to press to get YouTube to pull the trailer. A judge denied Cindy Lee Garcia's request Thursday that he order the clip removed. Superior Court Judge Luis Lavin says he rejected the request in part because Garcia hadn't served the film's producer with a copy of a lawsuit demanding its removal.

While the man behind an anti-Islam movie that ignited violence across the Middle East would likely face swift punishment in his native Egypt for making the film, in America the government is in the thorny position of protecting his free speech rights and looking out for his safety even while condemning his message.

The California man believed to be the maker of an anti-Islam film that ignited a firestorm in the Muslim world was cooperative when authorities escorted him to a voluntary interview, officials said Saturday. "It was all choreographed," said Steve Whitmore of the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department. "He was ready and willing and very cooperative."

If you can't keep track of all the Muslim protests erupting across the globe, you're not alone. The uproar over a 14-minute anti-Islam YouTube video has sparked furious protests from Somalia to Egypt to Sudan to Tunisia to Libya to Bangladesh to Indonesia to Pakistan. With new reports of protests surfacing every minute, we've compiled the latest reported incidents into this handy interactive Google Map. Click the locations and embedded links for more details about each incident.

One person was killed in Tripoli and many others injured, including Lebanese security force members, during protests Friday in the northern Lebanon city against a movie insulting the prophet Muhammad, according to the official Lebanese National News Agency.