[6][7] Kashgari became the subject of a controversy after he was accused of insulting the Islamic prophet Muhammad in three short messages published through the Twitter social networking service.

[8][9] King Abdullah ordered that Kashgari be arrested "for crossing red lines and denigrating religious beliefs in God and His Prophet".

[4][5] On February 7, 2012, Al-Bilad issued a statement saying that they had fired Kashgari five weeks earlier for the "inadequacy of his general views for the approach of the newspaper".

[7] Lawyers for Liberty and N. Surendran of the Malaysian People's Justice Party (PKR) stated that Kashgari was monitored by Mabahith in 2011 and that he was "on a Saudi watchlist of young pro-democracy activists who had voiced support for the Arab Spring uprisings".

[16] Kashgari published an article in al-Bilad about political prisoners,[17] who constitute one of the major motivations in the 2011–2012 Saudi Arabian protests[18] and made blog posts in support of Syrian uprising activists.

[14] In early February 2012, his group of activists were prevented by Saudi police from "organizing a series of forums to show solidarity with the Syrian uprising".

[8] The majority of Muslim scholars hold to the traditional view that apostasy in Islam is punishable by death or imprisonment until repentance, at least for adult men of sound mind.

[8][31] On February 8, the General Presidency of Scholarly Research and Ifta, headed by Saudi Grand Mufti Abdul-Azeez ibn Abdullaah Aal ash-Shaikh, issued a statement calling for Kashgari to be tried.

[32][33] In mid-February, the Grand Mufti of Egypt, Ali Gomaa, responded to the calls for Kashgari's execution stating, "We don't kill our sons, we talk to them."

[34] On February 12, the Association of British Muslims called for King Abdullah to drop any charges laid against Kashgari, stating "Thought crime is no crime at all...Any state enforced penalty for perceived blasphemy runs contrary to the true spirit of Islam, and of our Prophet, peace be upon him, who was compassionate even to those who scorned him...No one should be legally prosecuted, imprisoned or detained for simply expressing themselves.

[20] Kashgari and his lawyers believe that the calls for his execution may be politically motivated, as part of a crackdown on Saudi Arabian activists involved in the Arab Spring.

[38][39] King Abdullah ordered Kashgari's arrest "for crossing red lines and denigrating religious beliefs in God and His Prophet.

[46] Amnesty International,[2][21] Human Rights Watch,[43] Electronic Frontier Foundation,[47] Freedom House,[48] EveryOne Group,[49] and Front Line Defenders[50] called on the government of Malaysia to release Kashgari and not to extradite him to Saudi Arabia.

[54] Lawyers for Liberty claimed that Malaysian authorities violated international law by not allowing Kashgari to try to obtain political asylum.

[55] In August 2012, Kashgari's family published a poem by him in which he apologized for the offense he had caused, and they asked publicly for his release, a common practice during Eid Al-Fitr, the holiday marking the end of Ramadan.