Islamic Jihad threatened violence on Friday over caricatures of Islam's prophet Muhammad, printed in newspapers around the globe.
"Until now we have limited our action to demonstrations, but if they did not stop their offences to Prophet Mohammad we will defend the prophet with our souls and blood," Islamic Jihad leader Khader Habib told thousands of supporters after Friday prayers.
"So far we have demanded an apology from the governments. But if they continue their assault on our dear Prophet Mohammad, we will burn the ground underneath their feet," Habib said as dozens of gunmen fired rifles into the air.
Meanwhile, the Jyllands-Posten editor who commissioned cartoons of the prophet Mohammad that have
angered Muslims worldwide has been sent on holiday after suggesting he would print Iranian cartoons of the Holocaust.
The Danish newspaper published the cartoons of Muhammad last September. Muslims consider images of their prophet to be blasphemous and tensions flared in the Middle East in January after other European newspapers reprinted the cartoons in the name of free speech.
'Take a vacation'
"The editors have told Flemming Rose to take a vacation because no one can understand the kind of pressure he has been under," Jyllands-Posten editor Carsten Juste told Berlingske
Tidende newspaper.
Juste was not available for comment.
The chairman of the foundation which owns the newspaper, Asger Noergaard Larsen, refused calls to sack Juste and Rose, saying he fully backed the management and that there is no crisis at the newspaper.
"I think you could say that the violence in the Middle East and the boycott of Danish goods looks like a crisis, but we do not have a crisis," Larsen told Berlingske Tidende.
Flemming Rose, Jyllands-Posten's culture editor, told CNN on Wednesday he would consider publishing proposed Iranian cartoons of the Holocaust. The newspaper later made a public apology and played down
his comments.
"Flemming Rose has expressed regret for his error of judgment that must be ascribed to the fact that, during the past four months, he has experienced inhumanly hard pressure and been besieged by Danish as well as international media almost around the clock," Juste on his newspaper's Website.
"Under no circumstances will we allow ourselves to be latched onto the tasteless media stunt of an Iranian newspaper," Juste said.