We don’t blink twice when a Catholic supports abortion rights and women priests, as many do. We applaud when a Jew says the Bible doesn’t justify the occupation of the West Bank. We’re horrified by the crumbling wall of separation of church and state in the US. We support art that appalls the devout—remember Chris Ofili’s dung-decorated Madonna and Andres Serrano’s Piss Christ? Even 40 years later, we still laugh at Life of Brian.

We expect religious Christians and Jews to put up with being offended as the price of free speech and life in a multicultural society, and we take them to task when they don’t. Rudy Giuliani was roundly mocked when, as mayor of New York City, he tried to close the Brooklyn Museum over Ofili’s painting. We didn’t say, Let’s be more sensitive to the feelings of New York’s millions of Catholics. When a Christian fanatic burns down an abortion clinic, we don’t say, Well, that clinic should have known there would be trouble.

Why should we regard Islamist tyrants and the fanatics among their followers any differently?