if a Danish cartoon in a newspaper can set off riots 
  in countries where it is not published

...and several months after it has been published. What does it tell us? There are people who trigger the riots and decide when and how to influence the crowds. They, or their adjutants, are interested in using the "Danish newspapers"; not the people on the street.

  it does just seem a very dehumanized way of approaching a conflict 
  where actual real people are dying

There are people who need to be stopped, and getting them dead is sometimes the only way.