Everybody clap your hands, say, "Yeah." If you thought "fringe" elements within the radical left had no impact on the world at large, you'll please explain how the term "Islamophobia" now drips from the slobbering lips of mullahs in Iran. Salman Rushdie was knighted on Saturday, and the reaction in the land that gave us his murder sentence in absentia has been what you might expect. But now Pakistan, our putative "ally" in the war on terror, has officially objected to the conference of high title on the kufir novelist:

Iran has already accused British leaders of "Islamophobia" after Rushdie -- now Sir Salman -- was awarded the knighthood by Queen Elizabeth II on Saturday to mark her 81st birthday.

"If somebody has to attack by strapping bombs to his body to protect the honour of the Prophet, then it is justified," Pakistani Religious Affairs Minister Ijaz-ul-Haq told the national assembly.

The minister, the son of military dictator Zia-ul-Haq who died in a plane crash in 1988, later retracted his statement in parliament and said he meant to say that knighting Rushdie could spark terrorism.

"I was explaining that if the British government awards a knighthood to Salman Rushdie -- whose only credibility is that he wrote a blasphemous book -- then such action with encourage extremism," he told AFP.

"If someone blows himself up he will consider himself justified. How can we fight terrorism when those who commit blasphemy are rewarded by the West?" he said.

Now I ask, what is more likely: That a knighthood bestowed an internationally acclaimed writer of fiction will be rescinded or that Ijaz-ul-Haq's "retraction" was a pathetic attempt to avert responsibility for inciting the very kinds of fascistic murders he creams his jeans to have done?