Islamic mosque built at 9/11 Ground Zero
Posted: December 17, 2009
By Chelsea Schilling
© 2010 WorldNetDaily
Wreckage from plane that hit the twin towers fell on the same building that may serve as an Islamic cultural center.
A new Islamic mosque will open its doors just steps from Ground Zero where Muslim terrorists murdered 2,751 people in the name of Allah on Sept. 11, 2001 – and its leading imam, who conducts sensitivity training sessions for the FBI, has reportedly blamed Christians for starting mass attacks on civilians.
The five-story building at Park Place, just two blocks north of the former World Trade Center site, was the site of a Burlington Coat Factory. But a plane's landing-gear assembly crashed through the roof on the day 19 Muslim terrorists hijacked the airliners and flew them into the Twin Towers in 2001.
Now Muslim worshippers currently occupy the building, and they plan to turn it into a major Islamic cultural center.
"The men and women stand up, raise their hands on either side of their head, murmur 'Allahu akhbar,' bow and kneel again," reports Spiegel Online.
"Only in New York City is this possible," Daisy Khan, executive director of the American Society for Muslim Advancement, or ASMA, told the magazine. Khan is the wife of Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, founder of ASMA.
They have leased the new prayer space as an overflow building for another mosque, Masjid al-Farah, at 245 West Broadway in TriBeCa, where Rauf is the spiritual leader. The building – vacant since that fateful day when time stood still as millions of Americans grieved the loss of loved ones, friends, family members, co-workers and strangers – was purchased in July by real-estate company Soho Properties, a business run by Muslims. Rauf was an investor in that transaction.
Just down the street, the Museum of Jewish Heritage honors victims of the Holocaust, and St. Peter's Church, New York's oldest Catholic house of worship, is located around the corner.
Rauf has announced his plans to turn the building into a complete Islamic cultural center, with a mosque, a museum, "merchandising options," and room for seminars to reconcile religions, "to counteract the backlash against Muslims in general, " Speigel reports. The project may cost as much as $150 million.
Rauf told the New York Times purchasing the building "where a piece of the wreckage fell sends the opposite statement to what happened on 9/11."
"It was almost obvious that something like this had to arise from the ashes of 9/11," Khan told Spiegel. "In some way, this has the hand of the divine written over it. It's almost as if God wanted to be involved."
The move is supported by the city. The mayor's director of the Office of Immigrant Affairs, Fatima Shama, told the Times, "We as New York Muslims have as much of a commitment to rebuilding New York as anybody."
WND reported in 2003 when, at least four times that year, the FBI's New York field office held all-day sensitivity training sessions, not far from Ground Zero, featuring Rauf.
Speaking for about two hours each session, "he gave an overview of Islamic culture and some of the differences between what fundamentalist terrorist groups say are the teachings of the Quran and what he believes, as a student of religion, the Quran actually says," said special agent James Margolin, spokesman for the FBI New York office.
Rauf asserted that the Quran "certainly doesn't counsel terrorism, murder or mayhem," Margolin said. And he said terrorists have misinterpreted the Quranic term "jihad" to mean violent, or armed, struggle against nonbelievers. Rauf claims it means internal struggle.
Rauf was invited to speak in Sydney, Australia, by Premier Bob Carr in 2004. According to the Sydney Morning Herald, he said the U.S. and the West must acknowledge the harm they've done to Muslims before terrorism can end.
He said the West must understand the terrorists' point of view – and he blamed Christians for starting mass attacks on civilians.
"The Islamic method of waging war is not to kill innocent civilians. But it was Christians in World War II who bombed civilians in Dresden and Hiroshima, neither of which were military targets," he said. 
Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf (center) poses in a photo with attendees at a 2006 Muslim Leaders of Tomorrow conference in Copenhagen, Denmark. On the far left is Sultan Muhammad, communications coordinator for the Council on American-Islamic Relations in Chicago. (photo: CAIR Chicago)
According to the report, Rauf said there would be little progress until the U.S. acknowledged backing dictators and the U.S. president gave an "America Culpa" speech to the Muslim world. On June 4, 2009, President Obama gave a speech to the Muslim world from Cairo, in which he stated:
I have come here to seek a new beginning between the United States and Muslims around the world; one based upon mutual interest and mutual respect; and one based upon the truth that America and Islam are not exclusive, and need not be in competition. Instead, they overlap, and share common principles – principles of justice and progress; tolerance and the dignity of all human beings. …
So I have known Islam on three continents before coming to the region where it was first revealed. That experience guides my conviction that partnership between America and Islam must be based on what Islam is, not what it isn't. And I consider it part of my responsibility as president of the United States to fight against negative stereotypes of Islam wherever they appear.
Rauf praised Obama for "embracing Islam in the peacemaking process" in his speech to the Muslim world. He wrote in the Washington Post:
The historic significance of President Obama's speech to the Muslim world in Cairo cannot be overstated. Never before has an American president spoken to the global Muslim community. His speech marked a major shift in American foreign policy. … In just a few sentences he demolished the phony theory of the 'Clash of Civilizations,' which insists that Islam and the West must always be in conflict.
Instead, he declared the United States is not at war with Islam and outlined a plan for how the conflict can be resolved. … He captured the attention of Muslims because, unlike most politicians, he was willing to critique both his own country and Muslims where they fell short of their ideals.
In an interview with Beliefnet on Islam and America, a reporter asked Rauf, "Some Islamic charities are being investigated for terrorist ties. Have you seen what you consider to be reputable Islamic charities being financially damaged?"
"We believe that a certain portion of every charity has been legitimate," he responded. "To say that you have connections with terrorism is a very gray area. It's like the accusation that Saddam Hussein had links to Osama bin Laden. Well, America had links to Osama bin Laden – does that mean that America is a terrorist country or has ties to terrorism?"
In 2004, Rauf participated in a 30-second advertisement, broadcast on Arabic television, in which he apologized for alleged abuses at Abu Ghraib prison. The Times reported Rauf said he believes "Islamic terrorists do not come from another moral universe – that they arise from oppressive societies that he feels Washington had a hand in creating."
Cordoba Initiative (CI) aims to achieve a tipping point in Muslim-West relations within the next decade, steering the world back to the course of mutual recognition and respect and away from heightened tensions.
Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf is Chairman of Cordoba Initiative, having founded the organization in 2004.
In 1997, he founded the American Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA), the first Muslim organization committed to bringing American Muslims and non-Muslims together through programs in academia, policy, current affairs, and culture. As Imam of Masjid al-Farah, a mosque located twelve blocks from Ground Zero in New York City, he preaches a message of understanding between people of all creeds. Additionally, Imam Feisal sits on the Board of Trustees of the Islamic Center of New York and serves as an advisor to the Interfaith Center of New York.
Imam Feisal has appeared regularly at the Council on Foreign Relations and the World Economic Forum (Davos). He has been interviewed by and quoted in leading print media, including BBC, CNN, New York Times, Washington Post, Frontline, and Foreign Policy.
His publications include the books, Islam: A Search for Meaning, Islam: A Sacred Law (What every Muslim Should Know About the Shariah), and What's Right With Islam: A New Vision for Muslims and the West, which the Christian Science Monitor rated among its five best books of 2004; as well as articles such as “The Ideals We Share” (Newsweek, July 31, 2007) and “The End of Barbarism? The Phenomenon of Torture and the Search for the Common Good” (with Rev. Dr. William Schulz in Pursuing the Global Common Good, 2007).
Born in Kuwait and educated in England, Egypt, and Malaysia, Imam Feisal holds a Bachelor of Science in Physics from Columbia University in New York and a Master of Science in Plasma Physics from Stevens Institute of Technology in New Jersey. He speaks English, Arabic and Malay.
Important post by drpix:
"The project is a collaboration between the American Society for Muslim Advancement and the Cordoba Initiative."
To show you how brazen this enemy is and how craven our leaders are, here's the meaning of Cordoba to Muslims today:
Brief Europe: Muslims stopped from praying in mosque
Two Muslim tourists were arrested when they tried to pray inside Córdoba’s famous former mosque in Spain, breaking a ban imposed by the Roman Catholic Church. Half a dozen Austrian Muslims knelt to pray at the same time in the vast marble building, which was converted to a cathedral in the 13th century after Muslims were driven from Spain.
The two men who were detained were part of a group of 118 Austrian Muslims on an organised tour for young European Muslims. All bought tourist tickets for a tour of the cathedral on Wednesday. The six who started to pray faced charges of disturbing public order when they appeared before a judge in Córdoba. The Great Mosque of Córdoba was converted into a Christian church in 1236 after King Ferdinand III of Castile recaptured the city from the Muslims. The building later became the modern-day Cathedral of Our Lady of the Assumption
What the Muslim report does not say is that the site was a Christian Monastery before the Islamic invaders built their Mosque - even using columns from that Christian structure. Nor does the Muslim report tell you is that that Church was the scene of recent similar Muslim outrages. What the report does tell you is that even Muslim "tourists" are agents of their Global Jihad.
Muslim colonists make claims to Christian lands in the name of Allah and tell the Dhimmis it's as a "counterbalance to radicalism" and feckless Western leaders will not confront them.
Would "The Greatest Generation" have allowed Japanese to build a Shinto shrine at Pearl Harbor during WWII? How can Americans today allow a mosque at "Ground Zero?"
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Interview with Feisal Abdul Rauf
It's interesting that you call America a sharia-compliant state.
It really means there's a religious commandment to build the right society, to have a sense of social justice and a social safety net, to have laws that take care of human beings, that aren't prejudiced against people.