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ABC News' Christiane Amanpour has done a great service today with her panel discussion on whether America should fear Islam. Thanks to guests Franklin Graham, Robert Spencer and Peter Gadiel refusing to submit to Allah and political correctness, and the brashness of Anjem Choudary, Americans watching broadcast television have learned more about Islam in the hour long show than many have in the nine years since 9/11.Franklin Graham was unapologetic in his stance on Islam, however he differentiated between Islam the religion and Muslim people. Gary Bauer and Ayaan Hirsi Ali also deserve credit for speaking truth to Islam on...

The 9 News link came to me via my Google alert for 'September 11'. As you will see, the museum also contains a gallery on that subject. In a city-owned museum in Loveland, Colorado, where school children often make field trips, there is a 12-panel lithograph entitled "The Misadventures of the Romantic Cannibals" which the artist defends and the city refuses to remove. Not everyone there is amused. "It depicts clearly a picture of our Lord Jesus Christ engaging in an oral sex act with another person," says Deacon Ed Armijo of St. John's The Evangelist Catholic Church. Deacon Armijo...

Imam: NY Muslim Center Aims to Prevent Terror Attack Sunday, 26 Sep 2010 10:17 PM The imam behind the controversial plan to build a Muslim culture center near the site of New York's Sept. 11 attack said Sunday the project is meant to prevent a similar attack. In an interview with CBS's "60 Minutes" program, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf said he feels duty bound to help protect non-Muslim Americans from such violence.

“Bridge builder” Imam Feisal Abdel Rauf, the Muslim cleric behind plans for the Ground Zero mosque, has now been exposed as a man of shrewd cunning and as a calculating stealth jihadist who supports the creation of an Islamic State, “The Ummah,” right here in America. An interview has surfaced in which, after being assured that it has ended, Imam Rauf speaks “off-the-record” and reveals some intriguing plans and views that he has regarding America and the world. The interview, given on June 20th, 2006, sees Rauf speaking about his “game plan” for achieving an Islamic State without borders, which...

The developer of the proposed mosque near Ground Zero has begun repaying the $270,000 he owes in property taxes. Sharif el-Gamal walked into the Department of Finance payment center at 66 John St. on Wednesday and said he wanted to settle his tax bill, a department spokesman said. He paid $35,449.17 -- 15 percent of what his real-estate firm, Soho Properties, owed -- and said that the remaining $236,327.81 would then be taken care of in eight quarterly payments.

While the Imam behind plans for a mosque near Ground Zero was jetting around the globe and advocating for his Downtown project, a pair of dilapidated apartment buildings he owns in New Jersey fell into such disrepair that cops have to stand watch in the event of a fire. The fire watch, at taxpayer expense, was revealed during a court hearing today when Union City lawyers asked to have two buildings owned by Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf placed into receivership so that rent s could be used to fix dozens of violations, including inoperable alarms and sprinklers. Rauf skipped today’s

The Mayor of Union City, New Jersey blasted the Imam who wants to build a mosque and community center two blocks from ground zero for being a “slumlord.” At hastily called news conference Union City Mayor Brian Stack accused Imam Faisal Rauf of neglecting two apartment houses and ignoring numerous citations from the Union City’s Fire and Health Departments. Mayor Stack described the Imam as “unscrupulous” and questioned his statements about wanting to help people and build bridges while his own tenants were living in “shoddy conditions.”

NEW YORK – The imam leading the effort to build an Islamic center and mosque near the World Trade Center site said Monday that a resolution to the raging debate over its location is being examined. "We are exploring all options as we speak right now, and we are working to what will be a solution, God willing, that will resolve this crisis, defuse it and not create any unforeseen or untoward circumstances that we do not want to see happen," Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf said during a question-and-answer session following a speech before the Council on Foreign Relations. He...

The Muslim cleric behind plans to build a mosque close to the Ground Zero site has blamed politicians such as Sarah Palin for fuelling a "growing Islamophobia" that led to the burning of Korans on the ninth anniversary of the September 11 attacks. The Reverend Terry Jones abandoned his "international burn a Koran day" in Gainesville, Florida on Saturday but there were isolated instances in Tennessee and New York of the Muslim holy book being set alight. "What has happened is that..certain politicians decided that this project would be very useful for their political ambitions," Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf said,...

WASHINGTON (AFP) – The Islamic cleric behind plans to build a mosque near Ground Zero in New York warned Sunday that retreating on the project would only strengthen the hand of the Muslim extremists. But imam Feisal Abdul Rauf did not commit to keeping the Islamic cultural center at its current site, two blocks from where Al-Qaeda hijackers crashed planes into the World Trade Center. "The decisions that I will make -- that we will make -- will be predicated on what is best for everybody," he told ABC's "This Week" program. Thousands marched through New York on Saturday's ninth...

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) on Sunday strongly criticized Feisal Abdul Rauf, the imam seeking to build an Islamic community center and mosque near Ground Zero. “He seems by his actions to be more interested in confrontation than in healing,” Giuliani said on NBC’s "Meet the Press." The former mayor alleged that the plan is hurtful to the vast majority of family members of victims of the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks. Giuliani also said the imam has not been transparent about the project’s financing, and cited Rauf’s 2001 comment on CBS’s 60 Minutes that “United States...

PLAYING WITH FIRE

The Drudgereport website said it all: “Mosque opponents, supporters face off in downtown NYC…” ….And indeed it was. Today, with the special memorial service to the nearly three thousand people who died on September 11, 2001 not far from Ground Zero 1 (were the former WTC Towers stood) there were thousands of protestors both for and against the planned Ground Zero mosque and culture center met to challenge each other, sometimes to the point of near violence.

9/11/10 Koran burning at Ground Zero captured on video.

At his press conference, the first one in half a year among Barack Hussein Obama was seen not to be wearing his gold wedding band. Reason? Could it be that Muslims are not allowed to wear jewelry during Ramadan? I looked at quite a lot of speculation on the Internet. As always, there is a lot of static mixed in with a little bit of commentary, from both sides. Isn't it extremely odd that he suddenly shows up not wearing a wedding ring? Doesn't he know that this will open him up to a lot of speculation? Demand has a...

NEW YORK — Donald Trump's offer to buy an investor's stake where a mosque is planned near ground zero is falling flat.

(CNN) -- Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the religious leader behind plans to erect an Islamic center and mosque a few blocks from New York's ground zero, said Wednesday night that moving it to another location would embolden Islamic radicals and help them incite violence against Americans. "If we move from that location, the story will be the radicals have taken over the discourse," Rauf told CNN's Soledad O'Brien on "Larry King Live." Rauf said he was speaking about "radicals" on both sides of the debate on the Islamic center. "Our national security now hinges on how we negotiate this, how...

WASHINGTON – Former prime minister Tony Blair warned on Sunday that the roots of radical Islam were far deeper than we think and said Al-Qaeda would have killed 300,000 on September 11, 2001 if they could. "This is actually more like the phenomenon of revolutionary communism," Blair said in an interview with ABC News, commenting on the reach of Islamic extremism. "It's the religious or cultural equivalent of it, and its roots are deep, its tentacles are long, and its narrative about Islam stretches far further than we think into even parts of mainstream opinion who abhor the extremism, but...

The controversy over the 'Ground Zero mosque' has portrayed the United States as a land of bigots. Toby Harnden wonders why the US President has helped fuel this myth. It took a Manhattan taxi driver called Ahmed Sharif to speak out for America, which is being vilified as bigoted and Islamophobic because of the controversy generated by opposition to the so-called "Ground Zero mosque". The United States was his dream country, he enthused, and he loved New York City. "I feel like I belong here. This is the city actually [for] all colours, races, religion, everyone. We live here side...

Clinton hosting dinner for Ramadan geared toward young Muslims By Bridget Johnson - 09/04/10 01:27 PM ET The administration's marking of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan continues Tuesday when the State Department hosts an event. The administration's marking of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan continues Tuesday when the State Department hosts an event geared toward young Muslims and an Iftar dinner with Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. President Obama hosted an Iftar meal breaking the day's Ramadan fast on Aug. 13. In his speech, he supported the right of the Muslim community to build the planned controversial...