Muslim rage at Britain for knighting Salman Rushdie is spreading and growing, as the leaders of the Religion of Tolerance™ continue throwing fuel on the flames: Muslims hold new protests against Rushdie knighthood.

They’re working themselves up for a nice big explosion on Friday, the day of prayer.

ISLAMABAD (AFP) - Anger mounted in the Muslim world Wednesday over Britain’s knighthood for novelist Salman Rushdie, with protests spreading to Malaysia for the first time and fresh demonstrations in Pakistan. …

In Kuala Lumpur about 20 members of Malaysia’s main Islamic opposition, the Pan-Malaysia Islamic party, shouted “Go to hell Britain! Go to hell Rushdie!” outside the British High Commission. They handed a one-page memorandum to the British envoy during the rare half-hour demonstration, which was watched by police with riot shields and helmets. The police contingent was about as large as the protest.

“In the name of peace and mutual respect, we demand that the award be withdrawn, and the British government distance itself from a provocateur like Salman Rushdie,” party president Abdul Hadi Awang said in a statement.

In Pakistan hundreds of people protested in the central city of Multan, where an effigy of Rushdie and a British flag were burned for the third day running. Effigies of Britain’s Queen Elizabeth II were burned earlier this week. Traders, religious students and members of a religious party held separate demonstrations.

“Britain has tried to ignite the controversy of the cursed author Rushdie after more than a decade,” said Akhtar Butt, the leader of a local traders’ body. “It’s a deliberate attempt to provoke Muslims.”