The proposed Islamic cultural center and mosque near New York City's 9/11 site has divided families of nearly 3,000 people who died on 9/11.
While details of the funding for the $100 million complex just two blocks from the former World Trade Center site remain sketchy, proponents say the project would be a bridge between Islam and a city still recovering from the worst terrorist attack on American soil.
ABC News said: "For some survivors, erecting a mosque and 12-story glass-and-steel complex at the old Burlington Coat Factory at 45 Park Place in lower Manhattan is offensive. For others, the cultural center represents a step toward improved relations with the Muslim world.
ABC quoted Rabbi Shmuley Boteach as saying, "The center should include exhibits chronicling the rise of Islamic extremism, with a strong repudiation of terrorism. This question goes to the very heart of American democracy. On the one hand, stopping a mosque from being built undermines the very notion of freedom of worship in the United States. On the other hand, the idea of building a mosque and celebrating Islam at the site where 3,000 innocent Americans were killed by Islamic terrorists is an affront to so many people that I see it dividing New York and the nation."
The building at 45-47 Park Place, near Ground Zero dates back to the late 1850's when the building housed the headquarters of the Merck pharmaceutical company in the 1920's, then served as a discount clothing store, and in more recent years was used for Muslim prayer services. Present owners of the site known as The Cordoba Initiative hope to build a $100 million, 13-story community center with Islamic, interfaith and secular programming, similar to the 92nd Street Y," its website says. The project calls for a mosque, a performing arts center, gym, swimming pool and other public spaces. The Y on the Upper East Side of Manhattan is a Jewish-sponsored institution that has played a major role in New York and America-wide culture over many years along with serving everyday community needs.
Opponents who include some Sept. 11 victims' relatives, see the prospect of a mosque so near the destroyed trade center as an insult to the memory of the nearly 3,000 people killed by Islamic terrorists in the 2001 attacks. Shouts of "shame on you!" erupted from the audience after the city panel voted Tuesday to deny landmark protection to the existing building, saying the 152-year old structure wasn't distinctive enough.
Big name Republicans including former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich have criticized the plan - as has the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil rights group known for advocating religious freedom.
The American Center for Law and Justice, founded by the Rev. Pat Robertson, filed suit to challenge a city panel's decision to let developers tear down a building to make way for the mosque two blocks from ground zero. In this legal action, the Washington D.C.-based group represents a fire fighter who responded to and survived the terrorist attack at the World Trade Center.
Angry relatives of 9/11 victims clashed with supporters of a planned mosque near Ground Zero at a raucous community-board meeting in Manhattan on May 25, 2010. Opponents held up photos of loved ones killed in the Twin Towers and carried signs such as, "Honor 3,000, 9/11 -- No mosque!" Opponents of the proposed Cordoba House on Park Place called the plan an insult to terror-attack victims. But members of the Community Board voted 29-1 in support of the project, 9 members abstained, arguing that they wanted to table the issue and vote at a later date.
Supporters of the planned Islamic center see it as a monument to tolerance and religious liberty. Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the head of the Cordoba Institute, which is in charge of the project, insisted that the site would help "bridge the great divide" between Muslims and the rest of America. "We are Americans, we are Muslim Americans," Rauf said. "Many of us were born in the United States. We have no higher aspirations than to bring up our children in peace and harmony in this country."
New York's Mayor Michael Bloomberg has become an outspoken promoter of the project. In a prominent editorial, the International Herald Tribune congratulated him and itself came out totally in favor of the project. "Mayor Michael Bloomberg got it just right when he called the proposed mosque 'as important a test of separation of church and state as any we many see in our lifetime, and it is critically important that we get it right.' "
Former United States prosecutor Andrew McCarthy who prosecuted the first World Trade Center bombers is a public opponent of the mosque and he has written an article on what we can expect if the mosque becomes a reality. He argues that a mosque/cultural center in Fairfax Virginia that has been the center of much radical activity provides us with a troubling look into our future. McCarthy believes such mosque projects are linked to a Muslim Brotherhood game plan to establish centers of operation in and near major cities in the United States.
Sources:
CNN.com (July 14, 2010). In battle to build mosques near Ground Zero, opponents ask 'Why There?.'
http://articles.cnn.com/2010-07-14/us/new.york.ground.zero.mosque_1_landmark-status-landmark-preservation-commission-mosque?_s=PM:US
International Herald Tribune (August 5, 2010). Tolerance and 9/11. Editorial.
MSNBC (August 24, 2010). Group sues to stop mosque near NY's Ground Zero. Msnbc.msn.com
New York Post (May 26, 2010). NYers wage jihad vs. WTC Mosque. http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/nyers_wage_jihad_vs_wtc_mosque_UgJiOBYEhrSOw4Q6hpvbQL
Sanchez, Ray (May 18, 2010). Plans for mosque near ground zero draw outrage in New York. Abcnews.go.com.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/ground-mosque-plan-stirs-controversy/story?id=10670631
While details of the funding for the $100 million complex just two blocks from the former World Trade Center site remain sketchy, proponents say the project would be a bridge between Islam and a city still recovering from the worst terrorist attack on American soil.
ABC News said: "For some survivors, erecting a mosque and 12-story glass-and-steel complex at the old Burlington Coat Factory at 45 Park Place in lower Manhattan is offensive. For others, the cultural center represents a step toward improved relations with the Muslim world.
ABC quoted Rabbi Shmuley Boteach as saying, "The center should include exhibits chronicling the rise of Islamic extremism, with a strong repudiation of terrorism. This question goes to the very heart of American democracy. On the one hand, stopping a mosque from being built undermines the very notion of freedom of worship in the United States. On the other hand, the idea of building a mosque and celebrating Islam at the site where 3,000 innocent Americans were killed by Islamic terrorists is an affront to so many people that I see it dividing New York and the nation."
The building at 45-47 Park Place, near Ground Zero dates back to the late 1850's when the building housed the headquarters of the Merck pharmaceutical company in the 1920's, then served as a discount clothing store, and in more recent years was used for Muslim prayer services. Present owners of the site known as The Cordoba Initiative hope to build a $100 million, 13-story community center with Islamic, interfaith and secular programming, similar to the 92nd Street Y," its website says. The project calls for a mosque, a performing arts center, gym, swimming pool and other public spaces. The Y on the Upper East Side of Manhattan is a Jewish-sponsored institution that has played a major role in New York and America-wide culture over many years along with serving everyday community needs.
Opponents who include some Sept. 11 victims' relatives, see the prospect of a mosque so near the destroyed trade center as an insult to the memory of the nearly 3,000 people killed by Islamic terrorists in the 2001 attacks. Shouts of "shame on you!" erupted from the audience after the city panel voted Tuesday to deny landmark protection to the existing building, saying the 152-year old structure wasn't distinctive enough.
Big name Republicans including former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich have criticized the plan - as has the Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish civil rights group known for advocating religious freedom.
The American Center for Law and Justice, founded by the Rev. Pat Robertson, filed suit to challenge a city panel's decision to let developers tear down a building to make way for the mosque two blocks from ground zero. In this legal action, the Washington D.C.-based group represents a fire fighter who responded to and survived the terrorist attack at the World Trade Center.
Angry relatives of 9/11 victims clashed with supporters of a planned mosque near Ground Zero at a raucous community-board meeting in Manhattan on May 25, 2010. Opponents held up photos of loved ones killed in the Twin Towers and carried signs such as, "Honor 3,000, 9/11 -- No mosque!" Opponents of the proposed Cordoba House on Park Place called the plan an insult to terror-attack victims. But members of the Community Board voted 29-1 in support of the project, 9 members abstained, arguing that they wanted to table the issue and vote at a later date.
Supporters of the planned Islamic center see it as a monument to tolerance and religious liberty. Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the head of the Cordoba Institute, which is in charge of the project, insisted that the site would help "bridge the great divide" between Muslims and the rest of America. "We are Americans, we are Muslim Americans," Rauf said. "Many of us were born in the United States. We have no higher aspirations than to bring up our children in peace and harmony in this country."
New York's Mayor Michael Bloomberg has become an outspoken promoter of the project. In a prominent editorial, the International Herald Tribune congratulated him and itself came out totally in favor of the project. "Mayor Michael Bloomberg got it just right when he called the proposed mosque 'as important a test of separation of church and state as any we many see in our lifetime, and it is critically important that we get it right.' "
Former United States prosecutor Andrew McCarthy who prosecuted the first World Trade Center bombers is a public opponent of the mosque and he has written an article on what we can expect if the mosque becomes a reality. He argues that a mosque/cultural center in Fairfax Virginia that has been the center of much radical activity provides us with a troubling look into our future. McCarthy believes such mosque projects are linked to a Muslim Brotherhood game plan to establish centers of operation in and near major cities in the United States.
Sources:
CNN.com (July 14, 2010). In battle to build mosques near Ground Zero, opponents ask 'Why There?.'
http://articles.cnn.com/2010-07-14/us/new.york.ground.zero.mosque_1_landmark-status-landmark-preservation-commission-mosque?_s=PM:US
International Herald Tribune (August 5, 2010). Tolerance and 9/11. Editorial.
MSNBC (August 24, 2010). Group sues to stop mosque near NY's Ground Zero. Msnbc.msn.com
New York Post (May 26, 2010). NYers wage jihad vs. WTC Mosque. http://www.nypost.com/p/news/local/manhattan/nyers_wage_jihad_vs_wtc_mosque_UgJiOBYEhrSOw4Q6hpvbQL
Sanchez, Ray (May 18, 2010). Plans for mosque near ground zero draw outrage in New York. Abcnews.go.com.
http://abcnews.go.com/US/ground-mosque-plan-stirs-controversy/story?id=10670631
