Siraj Datoo has responded to our story in a statement, admitting he was wrong to write “Don’t let Charlie Hebdo be seen as a victim” in a 2011 Muslim News article:

“I wrote a piece more than 3 years ago as a 21 year old undergraduate student. The headline is false and overblown, and I regret it: the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists were victims then and were, horrifically, victims yesterday. I strongly believe in freedom of expression, which includes the freedom to offend.

The article was clumsily trying to say what many journalists have since reported, that the magazine was a provocative one, with satire that aimed to provoke, but that has no bearing on yesterday’s horrific, indefensible attacks.”

No apology…

So much solidarity with these guys #jesuischarlie pic.twitter.com/FEZnvemUiH

— Siraj Datoo (@dats) January 8, 2015

Here are 6 reasons why Buzzfeed’s UK political reporter Siraj Datoo might have thought twice before sending the above “#JeSuisCharlie” tweet today. Writing in Muslim News when Charlie Hebdo was previously firebombed in response to its publication of a cartoon of Muhammed, Datoo wrote under the headline “Don’t let Charlie Hebdo be seen as a victim”:

1. “Now Charlie Hebdo has started to act the martyr”
2. “The issue is simply an attempt to mock perceived Islamic values, rather than to make a serious point”
3. “this issue was direct goading and I argue that the primary aim was to create controversy”
4. “this special issue lacked hilarity and instead has continued the right-wing Islamophobic trend that has been sweeping the country”
5. “Perhaps the political leaders should now be asking whether they have indeed gone too far with their attack on Islam and should instead be concentrating on real matters that affect the nation”
6. “They re-published the same issue in the name of freedom of expression and started to whinge”

Hardly in keeping with Buzzfeed’s professed editorial values:

https://twitter.com/s_m_i/status/553038265109204998

We tried to get hold of Siraj Datoo, he was not available for comment…

NB. For context, here is the original article.

UPDATE: Nigel Farage weighs in:

It is very disappointing to read about journalists objecting to the freedom of expression: http://t.co/mXA1gzuscB

— Nigel Farage (@Nigel_Farage) January 8, 2015