Martin Burcharth, a U.S.-based correspondent for the Danish publication Information, says one must look at the cartoons episode through the prism of how Denmark treats its Muslim minority.

An excerpt from the NYT article:

... Denmark's reputation as a nation with a long tradition of tolerance toward others -- one solidified by its rescue of Danish Jews from deportation to Nazi concentration camps in 1943 and by the high levels of humanitarian aid it provides today -- is something of a myth.

What foreigners have failed to recognize is that we Danes have grown increasingly xenophobic over the years. To my mind, the publication of the cartoons had little to do with generating a debate about self-censorship and freedom of expression. It can be seen only in the context of a climate of pervasive hostility toward anything Muslim in Denmark.

There are more than 200,000 Muslims in Denmark, a country with a population of 5.4 million. A few decades ago, Denmark had no Muslims at all. Not surprisingly, Islam has come to be viewed by many as a threat to the survival of Danish culture.

For 20 years, Muslims in Denmark have been denied a permit to build mosques in Copenhagen. What's more, there are no Muslim cemeteries in Denmark, which means that the bodies of Muslims who die here have to be flown back to their home countries for proper burial.

Recently the minister for cultural affairs, Brian Mikkelsen of the Conservative People's Party, asked scholars, artists and writers to create a canon of Danish art, music, literature and film. The ostensible purpose was to preserve our homegrown classics.

But before the release of the canon last month, Mr. Mikkelsen revealed what may have been the real purpose of the exercise: To create a last line of defense against the influence of Islam in Denmark. "In Denmark we have seen the appearance of a parallel society in which minorities practice their own medieval values and undemocratic views," he told fellow conservatives at a party conference last summer. "This is the new front in our cultural war."