Posted on June 8, 2017

Charlie Hebdo Runs Image of Decapitated Theresa May on Front Page and Mocks London Bridge Terror Victims

James Rothwell, Telegraph, June 8, 2017

The latest issue of Charlie Hebdo, the French satirical magazine, shows a decapitated Theresa May on the front page and includes a cartoon which mocks victims of the London Bridge terror attacks.

Under the headline “English multiculturalism,” the graphic front page depicts Theresa May carrying her severed head under her arm and saying: “Too much is too much.”

Charlie Hebdo Theresa May

And a cartoon inside shows a group of terrified people running past Big Ben – one of them holding a pint of beer – alongside the caption “Slimming tips from Daesh (Islamic State).”

The issue was published just hours before polls opened in a general election marred by terror attacks in London and Manchester which left more than 20 people dead and dozens more injured.

The cartoon of people running is a reference to Saturday’s attack in London,  where a trio of Islamic extremists ploughed a van into a crowd on London Bridge before stabbing people in the Borough Market area. They killed eight people and injured 48.

Some social media users have reacted with fury to the cartoons, with one branding them “horrific.”

The magazine’s staff have personal experience of terrorism – in January 2015, Islamic extremists burst into their offices in Paris and gunned down 12 people in reaction to cartoons which mocked the Prophet Mohammad.

In the edition which followed the attack in Paris, Charlie Hebdo’s front page showed a picture of the Prophet holding up a sign which said, “all is forgiven.”

The magazine sparked outrage after running a cartoon which depicted the corpse of Aylan Kurdi, a Syrian toddler who became a powerful symbol of the refugee crisis after a photograph of him lying dead in the sand was broadcast worldwide.

The same cartoon showed a group of lascivious-looking migrants chasing after a woman with their tongues hanging out, alongside the caption: “What would little Aylan have become? A butt groper.”

Supporters of the magazine said at the time that it was trying to satirize Europeans who believed that all refugees and migrants from the Middle East and North Africa were sexual predators.