Next Media Animation, the Taiwanese animation company that takes news and animates it, has put together their take on the recent happenings to political cartoonist Ali Ferzat. Ferzat is a Syrian cartoonist who was assaulted by government thugs. There’s been an outcry of support for Ferzat and it’s only added to the calls for a regime change in the country.
Political cartoonist Ali Ferzat responded to the beating he received from Syrian pro-government forces. This tweet went up not long ago.
It linked to this cartoon drawn by Ali Ferzat. I think it says it all.
Update – Over on his website Ali Ferzat the confusion has been cleared and the drawing was not done by Ferzat, but by a supporter. The translation from the website, according to Google translate, is:
Dear friends, this is not a caricature of Mr. Ali Farzat fee and has no relation with it. Therefore necessary to note, thank you.
A friend of Mr. Ali Farzat
Also, the American Association of Editorial Cartoonists has condemmed the attack and are urging world governments to do the same. Their statement:
As cartoonists, we are outraged at the pointed brutality of the attack on Mr. Ferzat. Breaking the hands of a cartoonist is more than an attack on one brave individual, it’s an attack on the right of a people to express themselves. It’s an act of a desperate regime foolishly thinking that its violence and efforts to intimidate will keep a cartoonist from criticizing the regime’s repressive behavior.
Instead, it only sets hundreds of hands to drawing the clear conclusion that those behind the brutal repression have lost all legitimacy.
Ali Ferzat, a cartoonist who has been critical of the Syrian government, was forced from his car and brutally beaten. According to the UN more than 2,200 have been killed in protesting the government since mid-March. They are demanding the removal of President Bashar al-Assad whose family has been in power for 40 years.
One of Ali Ferzat’s latest cartoons shows President Assad sweatily clutching a suitcase while he tries to hitch a lift with the Libyan leader, Col Muammar Gaddafi, who is furiously driving a getaway car.
Activists in Syria say Ferzat was forcibly removed from his car in Damascus, beaten and dumped at the side of a road.
The BBC has more on the situation in Syria.
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