Abdul Rahman Freed

Abdul Rahman, the Afghan threatened with the death penalty for converting to Christianity, has been released from prison.

His case was dropped because he was "mentally unfit to stand trial."

I think the conclusion that Rahman was mentally ill was a convenient pretext to spare his life without inflaming the radical Muslims.

The radicals riot and kill because of a few cartoons. Obviously, An excuse was needed to pacify those poised to go on a violent rampage over this one.

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) -- The announcement came after the United Nations said Abdul Rahman has appealed for asylum outside Afghanistan and that the world body was working to find a country willing to take him.

Justice Minister Mohammed Sarwar Danish told The Associated Press that the 41-year-old was released from the high-security Policharki prison on the outskirts of Kabul late Monday.

"We released him last night because the prosecutors told us to," he said. "His family was there when he was freed, but I don't know where he was taken."

Deputy Attorney General Mohammed Eshak Aloko told the AP that prosecutors had issued a letter calling for Rahman's release because "he was mentally unfit to stand trial." He also said he did not know where he was being held.

He said Rahman may be sent overseas for medical treatment.

I don't think there is any doubt that U.S. and Western intervention played a role in Rahman's release.

The results were good for Rahman, but our State Department can't be appealing on behalf of every individual that Islamic extremists want to kill because of conversion. Although this crisis has been settled, it's not a solution to the religious intolerance ingrained in Afghanistan.

Hours earlier, hundreds of clerics, students and others chanting "Death to Christians!" marched through the northern Afghan Mazar-i-Sharif to protest the court's decision Sunday to dismiss the case.

"Abdul Rahman must be killed. Islam demands it," said senior Cleric Faiez Mohammed, from the nearby northern city of Kunduz. "The Christian foreigners occupying Afghanistan are attacking our religion."

There are plenty of American Lefties that would agree with Faiez Mohammed, that we are occupiers and forcing our beliefs on the Afghans.

So what is the answer?

I suppose we need to encourage tolerance and human rights, but it's hard to appeal to the humanity of a people that chant "Death to Christians!"

It's crazy.

Muslims killed three thousand people on our soil and I don't recall a single organized protest with hundreds of people chanting "Death to Muslims!"