Paris ? A fierce international debate between Western democratic values and religious sensitivities escalated Thursday as Muslims reacted angrily to wider publication of controversial caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad.

First published in September by a Danish newspaper, the caricatures appeared recently in newspapers in France, Germany, Italy, Spain, the Netherlands and even Jordan.

Muslims, who believe any depiction of God and the prophets is blasphemy, are outraged at drawings of Muhammad with a bomb as a turban, among others.

One cartoon shows Muhammad standing on a cloud as he tells a group of suicide bombers that Paradise has run out of the virgins that are said to await martyrs upon their death.

Conflict heated up on multiple fronts Thursday. In the Gaza Strip, masked Palestinian gunmen fired weapons into the air as they surrounded an office of the European Union and a French cultural center. Two Palestinian militant groups threatened to retaliate against the offending publications by kidnapping European citizens and targeting churches and European offices.

In Paris, the France Soir tabloid abruptly fired its managing editor for reprinting the caricatures in Wednesday’s edition, whose cover carried the paper’s own cartoon of Muhammad alongside Christian, Jewish and Buddhist holy figures. “Don’t complain, Muhammad, we’re all being caricatured here,” the Christian God says.

Tunisia and Morocco banned the sale of France Soir.

Editorialists, political leaders and advocates of media freedom said a Muslim backlash that has included boycotts, death threats and flag-burnings jeopardizes democratic rights.

Pakistani religious students burn the Danish flag in Multan, Pakistan. Demonstrators had nationwide rallies and burnt Danish and French flags and effigies of their leaders Thursday to condemn publication in Denmark and other nations of cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad.

“The reaction in Muslim countries shocks me because it confirms the weight that radical Islam has acquired,” said Patrick Chappatte, a cartoonist quoted in Le Temps newspaper in Switzerland. “The same way that they veil women, Islamic radicals want to veil cartoons in the press.”

But Muslim leaders accused European media of provoking strife by humiliating Islam.

“Freedom of expression cannot be the freedom to lie,” said Dalil Boubakeur, the imam of the Mosque of Paris and president of the French Muslim Council. “The prophet did not found a terrorist religion, but on the contrary a religion of peace.”

Afghan President Hamid Karzai said the furor exacerbated religious tension.

“Any insult to the Holy Prophet – Peace Be Upon Him – is an insult to more than a billion Muslims,” Karzai said in a statement.