ktspktsp

Agreed. You know, the closer you are to an area where stuff like that is happening, the better you can see the different factors at play.

I woke up this morning to see that the Danish embassy in Beirut (my original hometown) was burned down. After the initial shock, and reading up on this demonstration-turned-violent, I can see the different aspects of it:

1) Fringe extremist groups (mostly from outside Beirut) were bused in.
2) 2/3 of those arrested (basically the ones that were agitating things) were Syrian and Palestinian (though probably the majority of those demonstrating where Lebanese Sunnis, not Shias (i.e. not Hizbullah at this point)).
3) Rocks were thrown at a nearby church.

So, analyzing that, I can tie it to the troubles we've had since the Syrians were forced to withdraw; the fact that they still have agents in Lebanon trying to forment troubles (and that they are locked in a conflict with Western powers at this time), the fact that Palestinians are still mostly-unwelcome-guests, many of them with weapons. There's also the crossing of a red line by throwing stones at a church which very few groups would actually do in Lebanon, there's the situation of the fringe religious groups in economically deprived areas of the country, who have had clashes with the government before, etc..

So, basically, there's a lot more at play here than just cartoons -> burnt embassies. I only know this much detail about Lebanon, but I can imagine there are complexities like those in every country where this is happening..

Simplistic analysis, such as "Damn Muslim world, hating the freedom of the press, fighting the West because of some cartoons" is not useful.