The Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons were first published by Jyllands-Posten in late September 2005; approximately two weeks later, nearly 3,500 people demonstrated peacefully in Copenhagen. In November, several European newspapers re-published the images, triggering more protests. Labour strikes began in Pakistan the following month, and several organizations criticized the Danish government. More protests occurred in January 2006, and later that month a boycott of Danish goods began. Comedian Omar Marzouk ridicules Muhammad as he defends freedom of speech. Several countries withdrew their ambassadors to Denmark, and widespread protests, some of them violent, began. The protests continued in February. In Damascus, Syria, both the Norwegian embassy and a building containing the Danish, Swedish, and Chilean embassies were stormed and set on fire by protesters. In Beirut, thousands of people protested on the streets, and the Danish General Consulate was stormed and set on fire. As of 2 March 2006, at least 139 people have died primarily during riots stemming from protests. On 1 January 2010, a man was shot whilst attempting to kill Kurt Westergaard, one of the original cartoonists.

2003

April

Jyllands-Posten denied an unsolicited submission that caricatured the resurrection of Jesus, with the reason, that they were not funny, and would "offend some readers, not much but some".

2005

September

30 September

October

14 October

17 October

19 October

28 October

November

3 November

7 November

24 November

December

2 December

5 December

6 December

7 December

17 December

19 December

29 December

2006

January

1 January

6 January

7 January

10 January

23 January

24 January

26 January

27 January

28 January

29 January

30 January

31 January

February

1 February

2 February

3 February

4 February

5 February

6 February

7 February

8 February

9 February

10 February

11 February

12 February

13 February

14 February

15 February

16 February

17 February

18 February

19 February

20 February

21 February

22 February

24 February

26 February

27 February

28 February

"We aren't even talking about the prosecution of Christians in Muslim countries, we are simply stating the truth: these people actually suffered because of their beliefs'. Furthermore, the Saint Benedict Foundation argues that freedom of religion is non-existent in most Muslim countries and that non-Muslims are still prosecuted in these countries, but we don't mention this on our posters because of the recent cartoon controversy. A tramcompany in Poznan was willing to display the posters on their trams after a buscompany in Warsaw refused it."

March

1 March

2 March

3 March

4 March

15 March

17 March

20 March

21 March

22 March

29 March

30 March

This lawsuit was dismissed on 26 October.

April

3 April

5 April

10 April

12 April

24 April

May

12 May

26 May

30 May

July

31 July

September

October

1 October

16 October

26 October

November

24 November

December

4 December

2007

January

4 January

Umran Javed (Birmingham) was found guilty of soliciting murder by having chanted death threat slogans during an anti-cartoon rally at London's Danish embassy. He, and three other young British Muslim men, were later sentenced to between four and six years in prison for their actions and statements during that demonstration.

February

2 February

A student guest editor of one of the several student newspapers of Clare College, Cambridge reprints one of the cartoons in an issue devoted to religious satire. It is only the second student newspaper (and fourth media outlet) in the UK to reprint the cartoons in whole or in part. Widespread student outrage ensues—although the National Secular Society leaps to the editor's defense—and Clare punitively cuts the paper's funding in response the incident, as well as destroying most copies of the newspaper. The editor, against whom Clare initiates disciplinary action, is forced to go into hiding for his safety. Ultimately, the editor was reprimanded and forced to publish an apology.

7 February

The French newspaper Libération reprints the Mohammed cartoons anew, to highlight the start of a trial against another French newspaper, Charlie Hebdo, and in support of free speech. The trial was initiated by several major Muslim organizations who sued Charlie Hebdo because of their decision to publish the cartoons in February 2006.

March

30 March

Islamic countries pushed through a resolution of the United Nations Human Rights Council, which "prohibits the defamation of religion". The resolution mentions no religion except Islam. The initiative was brought in the immediate aftermath of the cartoon controversy, and is considered a direct response to it.

July

13 July

A network of Danish Muslim organisations, upon losing a libel court case against the Danish People's Party, threatens a fatwa against Jyllands-Posten unless the paper apologizes.

October

2 October

During the ongoing trial of four terror suspects arrested in Denmark, known as the Vollsmose case, one of the accused testified that Jyllands-Posten culture editor Flemming Rose was the target of a terror bombing the group had planned. According to the suspect, they were considering sending a remote-controlled car packed with explosives into the private residence of the editor. Threats were also allegedly made towards Danish MP Naser Khader, who defended the publication of the cartoons.

2008

February

12 February

On 12 February 2008, Danish police arrested three men (two Tunisians and one Danish national originally from Morocco) suspected of planning to assassinate Kurt Westergaard, the cartoonist who drew the Bomb in the Turban cartoon. Shortly afterwards, the Dane was released without charge; the two Tunisians were not charged either, but expelled to Tunisia. Despite this, Westergaard has since been under police protection. He has said he is angry that a "perfectly normal everyday activity [drawing political cartoons] which I used to do by the thousand was abused to set off such madness." The next day, 13 February 2008, Jyllands-Posten, and many other Danish newspapers including Politiken and Berlingske Tidende, reprinted Westergaard's Bomb in the Turban cartoon, as a statement of commitment to freedom of speech. The liberal newspaper Politiken had been critical of the original publication of the cartoons, but reprinted this one now as a gesture of solidarity in the face of a specific threat. In Denmark, some public disturbances with burnt-out cars and a school set ablaze followed these events, but the police are unsure if it is directly related to the cartoons controversy or the fact that the two Tunisians were subsequently sentenced to deportation without a trial. Other sources claim the riots in the Nørrebro district of Copenhagen, which started before the arrests, were wholly unrelated to the cartoons controversy, and were rather set off by police harassment of ethnic minorities in areas of Copenhagen. Some disturbances had occurred already in the days preceding the arrests. Peaceful demonstrations were held in Copenhagen after Friday prayers, with the flags of Hizb ut-Tahrir prominent.

13 February

Several Danish newspapers, including Jyllands-Posten, reprints one of the cartoons as a response to the news of the arrest made the day before.

19 February

Egypt banned editions of four foreign newspapers including the New York-based Wall Street Journal and Britain's The Observer for reprinting the controversial Danish cartoons criticizing Muhammad.

March

20 March

A video allegedly from Osama bin Laden threatens the EU over the reprinting of the cartoon.

June

2 June

An attempt to blow up the Danish embassy in Islamabad.

October

In October 2008, Ekstra Bladet published excerpts from an interview with Taliban spokesman Qari Yousuf Ahmadi saying Danish troops in Oruzgan Province are a "primary target" of the Taliban because of the cartoon issue, adding the Danes would be forced to leave Afghanistan.

2009

August

Officials at Yale University Press decided to expunge reproductions of the cartoons along with all other images of Muhammad from a scholarly book entitled The Cartoons that Shook the World, by professor Jytte Klausen. News of the decision sparked criticism from some prominent Yale alumni as well as from the American Association of University Professors. Yale defended its rationale by saying it feared inciting violence if the images were published. Flemming Rose, the cultural editor who commissioned the cartoons, has described Yale's action as "[giving] in to intimidation... not even intimidation but an imagined intimidation". The images of Muhammad censored by Yale were published in the 2009 book Muhammad: The "Banned" Images.

2010

January

On 1 January 2010, Danish police shot and wounded a man at the home of Kurt Westergaard in Aarhus. Westergaard drew the best known of the cartoons, which depicted Muhammad with a bomb in his turban. The man was described as a 28-year-old Somali linked to the Islamist al-Shabab militia. He reportedly shouted in broken English that he wanted to kill Westergaard, who alerted police after locking himself into a panic room in the house, which was a specially fortified bathroom. Police said that the man was "armed with an axe and a knife in either hand", and broke down the entrance door of the house with the axe. The man attempted unsuccessfully to break down the door of the panic room while shouting swear words. He was shot in his right leg and left hand after reportedly throwing the axe at a police officer who arrived at the scene. Westergaard's five-year-old granddaughter was present in the living room of the house during the incident, but neither Westergaard nor his grandchild were harmed. Bomb disposal experts searched the home in order to ensure that a device had not been planted. The Somali man was carried into court on a stretcher to face two charges of attempted murder, which he denied. He was not named at the time of his arrest as the result of an injunction in the Danish courts. A spokesman for al-Shabab, Sheikh Ali Muhamud Rage, commented: "We appreciate the incident in which a Muslim Somali boy attacked the devil who abused our prophet Mohammed and we call upon all Muslims around the world to target the people like him." On 4 February 2011, the attacker, named in court as Mohamed Geele, was sentenced to nine years in prison for attempting to commit an act of terrorism. Geele appealed the sentence, claiming that he was attempting to scare Westergaard to make him "stop bragging about drawing the cartoon", but was subsequently sentenced to 10 years imprisonment and permanent expulsion from Denmark by the High Court on 22 June 2011.

February

Following a meeting between the editor-in-chief of the Danish newspaper Politiken Tøger Seidenfaden and Faisal A.Z. Yamani, Saudi attorney-at-law, who represented eight Muslim groups from the Middle East and Australia, the Danish newspaper apologized for having reprinted a cartoon by Kurt Westergaard in 2008, and issued a press release saying: "Politiken has never intended to reprint the Cartoon Drawing as a statement of editorial opinion or values but merely as part of the newspaper's news coverage (...) We apologize to anyone who was offended by our decision to reprint the cartoon drawing." The apology prompted criticism from leading Danish politicians, among them prime minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen, who stated that "Politiken is bowing to other's views of our freedom of speech and this can lead to further attacks on Danish freedom of speech," as well as the head of the Danish Union of Journalists, but Politiken has replied that the settlement did not mean that it had imposed on itself a ban on future publications of the drawings.

September

8 September

German Chancellor Angela Merkel honours cartoonist Kurt Westergaard. He received the M100 media prize for his "courage" to defend democratic values despite threats of violence and death. The Central Council of Muslims in Germany criticized the award ceremony.

10 September

A small explosion at Hotel Jørgensen in Copenhagen was described by the police as an accident with a letter bomb that was meant to be sent to Jyllands-Posten.

28 September

A 37-year-old Iraqi Kurd that was arrested in Norway earlier that year suspected of planning unspecified terrorist attacks confessed that one of his targets was Jyllands-Posten.

30 September

The journalist Flemming Rose published his 500-page book Tavshedens Tyranni (Tyranny of Silence) on the fifth anniversary of the first publishing of the cartoons.

October

5 October

The newspaper destroyed an edition of its weekend supplement, Uke-Adressa, before it was distributed. The reason was a satirical drawing by the newspaper's cartoonist, Jan O. Henriksen, that editor Arne Blix in subsequent interviews stated was in conflict with editorial policies. Blix declined to give details of the drawing or the reason for its unacceptability, however according to Henriksen the depiction was of Kurt Westergaard holding one of his Mohammad drawings.

13 October

Denmark's foreign minister Lene Espersen met in Cairo with the Grand Imam of Al-Azhar, Ahmed al-Tayeb, on 13 October 2010, and stated that the hurt caused to Muslims from cartoons lampooning Muhammad was "very regrettable". She denies that this should be interpreted as an apology for the drawings, stating "I explained that the people of Denmark has no wish to violate or hurt the feelings of others. We do not wish to demonize anyone, we are a tolerant people. And then I explained our constitutional right to free speech, and they understood".

December

In December 2010, a classified diplomatic cable leaked that had been written in September 2006 by James P. Cain, the United States Ambassador to Denmark at the time. It reported that the Jyllands-Posten had decided against reprinting the cartoons on the first anniversary of the original publication, and observed: "Our discreet discussions with the paper and with senior Danish government officials underscore both how close we came to another potential crisis and how much the defense of free speech and domestic political calculations remain paramount for the government and for many Danes."

29 December

Five men were arrested in connection with a suspected plot to stage a gun attack of the offices of the Jyllands-Posten in Copenhagen. Jakob Scharf, the head of Denmark's PET intelligence agency, described the men as "militant Islamists". Four of the suspects, including Munir Awad, were detained in Denmark, and the fifth was detained in Sweden.

2011

February

Commemorating the demonstrations in Benghazi on 17 February 2006 that were initially against the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons, but which turned into protests against Gaddafi, the National Conference for the Libyan Opposition plans a coordinated protest by all anti-Gaddafi groups. The ensuing "Day of Revolt" or "Day of Rage" against Muammar Gaddafi develops into the Libyan Civil War.

2012

January

Oslo District Court found two men guilty of planning a terror attack against Jyllands-Posten and the cartoonist Kurt Westergaard. In October Borgarting Court of Appeal upheld the convictions and sentenced one of the convicted who is of Uighur origin to eight years in prison and the other who is of Iraqi Kurdish origin to three years in prison. The former has appealed the sentence to the Supreme Court of Norway.

2013

February

A few days after the assumed assassination attempt of Lars Hedegaard, The Islamic Society in Denmark stated that it had been a mistake to go to Lebanon and Egypt in 2006 to show the caricatures of Muhammad.

March

Kurt Westergaard and his Danish gallery "Galleri Draupner" released a new edition of the Muhammad cartoons. The first one was made in 2000 for the Danish art museum in Frederikshavn and the second and third were made for Jyllands Posten. They were all handmade, printed, framed, numbered (only 40 were printed) and sold in an all-leather box on a special event in the gallery in Skanderborg.

2021

March

A teacher working at Batley Grammar School in Batley, North England was suspended after showing students an image of the cartoon of Muhammad taken from the Danish newspaper. The teacher went under police protection, with authorities worried for her safety following the murder of Samuel Paty in which a French teacher was decapitated for allegedly showing students an image of Muhammad made by Charlie Hebdo.