Is Google Digging Its Own Grave?

Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) has rejected the White House’s pleas to remove an incendiary video from YouTube that has fueled anti-American sentiment in Muslim communities and resulted in violence against Americans abroad, including an attack in which the U.S. ambassador to Libya was killed.

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“We’ve restricted access to [the video] in countries where it is illegal such as India and Indonesia, as well as Libya and Egypt, given the very sensitive situations in these countries,” the company said. “This approach is entirely consistent with principles we first laid out in 2007.”

The video, which depicts Prophet Mohammad as a fraud and a philanderer, is being blamed for numerous attacks on Americans on foreign soil. Ambassador John Christopher Stevens and three other Americans were killed in a siege on the U.S. embassy in Benghazi last week. Similar attacks took place on the U.S. embassy in Cairo.

But Google has so far refused to remove the anti-Islamist film, “Innocence of Muslims,” from its video-sharing site. Google said the amateur film did not violate YouTube’s terms of service, and that it had only censored the video in countries where it violated local laws rather than in response to political pressure.

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