Has this chap become the subject of a fatwa? Or indeed charged with breaking any law?
The problem is that nowadays every mortal thing seems get recorded, publicised and talked about. People on all sides start making hyperbolic statements about "defending religion and beliefs", or "freedom to criticise belief systems", etc etc ad nauseam.
IMO what this chap did was an idiotically disrespectful, spur of the moment thing (rather than a piece of actual satire) , but he seems now to realise it as such, has apologised, and that should be the end of the matter. But because it's been preserved for posterity on film, and social media, and there's been so much fuss about it, British gymnastics has to be seen to be doing something.
So I have no time for the noise of either party, I am afraid. Brendan O'Neill is confusing internet babble with something more sinister. A bit like his Spectator colleague Douglas Murray did in a similar article weeks ago (tho it was lack of internet babble that bothered Douglas, as I recall)