Charlie Hebdo stirs new scrutiny with migrant cartoons

France’s Charlie Hebdo, the newspaper that became a global icon of no-limits satire when several of its cartoonists were killed by Islamist gunmen, is courting controversy again with drawings inspired by the plight of people fleeing war zones for Europe.

In its latest edition from September 9, the publication has attracted renewed media attention, and criticism on social networks, over cartoons deriding the response of predominantly Christian European countries to a flood of migrants from mainly Muslim conflict zones like Syria and Iraq.

One drawing on the newspaper’s back page plays on a harrowing photo that emerged last week of Aylan Kurdi, the drowned Syrian child whose body washed up on a beach in Turkey after a failed attempt to make a boat crossing with his family to Greece. The photograph galvanised world attention on the refugee crisis.

The Charlie Hebdo cartoon shows a toddler in shorts and a T-shirt face-down on the shoreline, beside an advertising billboard that offers two children’s meal menus for the price of one.

“So close to making it …” the caption reads.

Another cartoon, penned by a cartoonist who survived the Jan. 7 attack on Charlie Hebdo’s Paris premises, runs under a caption saying: “Proof that Europe is Christian”.

It shows a Jesus-like figure walking on the water while another, smaller figure wearing shorts is upended in the water, with the former saying “Christians walk on water” and the latter “Muslim children sink”.

Many social network users vented anger and frustration over the new cartoons.

One hashtag many social network users turned to to do so on Twitter on Tuesday was #JeNeSuisPasCharlie (I Am Not Charlie) – that grew popular as a counterweight to the “Je Suis” campaign.

“Are you on drugs @Charlie Hebdo?” questioned one social media user, another qualifying the use of the drawing as “sick”. But others had another view arguing that many did not understand the humour: “Lack of culture, first degree ravages: Charlie Hebdo drawings if Aylan’s death shock abroad,” said one user.

Britain’s Daily Mirror published a headline on its website saying: “Charlie Hebdo publishes cartoons mocking dead Aylan Kurdi with caption ‘Muslim children sink’. It quotes a lawyer saying on Twitter that the French publication could face legal action for overstepping the mark.

Many other media outlets stopped short of condemning the enfant terrible of the French press, but suggested Charlie Hebdo could face further troubles or legal woes for its latest work.

But in the streets of Paris, the recent drawings did not shock many.

“I understand perfectly Charlie Hebdo’s sense of humour and I know that many French don’t understand this humour. When you read between the lines I think this drawing is a call for European authorities, mocking them, for not having dealt with such horrors,” said Parisian Zhineb Khalfallah.

And for Mamadou Bare, who 20 years ago made the journey from Burkina Fasso to France, the cartoon conveys a simple message.

“I understand it my way, it is a way to say we need to extend our help, quickly find a solution to this terrible situation,” he said.

Charlie Hebdo was struggling financially with weekly sales of as low as 30,000 before two assailants attacked its downtown Paris offices in January, killing its editor-in-chief and top cartoonists in an attack.

That attack, after which an outpouring of solidarity helped the weekly sell millions of copies worldwide and transformed it into an international symbol of free speech, followed the publication of cartoons mocking Muslim Prophet Mohammad.

Back then, the massive showing of solidarity gave birth to a slogan that took the Internet by storm – “Je Suis Charlie”, or “I am Charlie”.