Obama backs mosque near ground zero

[Brittain33]

I think many people in the U.S. are having a problem with Islam because of 9/11 and Islam's relationship with Christianity, but I think an advantage we have over Europe is that we've been a diverse country for centuries, we've done mass immigration and religious diversity before, so it's not new and we can see what the path forward is which leads to some kind of assimilation and many different flavors of Islam from merely cultural to fundamentalist. IF we allow it to happen and not put up roadblocks to moderate Islam, as some of my fellow Americans seem to want to do with Cordoba House. Muslims are just one of many minorities in the U.S.

Europe hasn't had mass immigration quite like this before--there are some examples, but nothing quite like this and across the continent--and in many places Muslims may be the only substantial religious community because Christian observance has fallen to a basic cultural level.

[Brittain33]

Here is Debra Burlingames'  group http://www.911familiesforamerica.org which has embedded interviews of her with Fox.

I don't dispute her loss, but Debra Burlingame has been a right-wing activist for a decade, and represents her own agenda more than any sizable number of 9/11 families. If you take 3,000 victims and multiply them by the number of close relatives they have, it's no surprise you'll find at least one who has strong political views and television savvy to carry it off. I don't see why it's relevant. She doesn't have a personal veto over government policy, much less the 1st Amendment. 

[Brittain33]

If I bought a piece of property next to one of the Nazi death camps it would be "legal" to build a educational exhibit highlighting all the wonderful achievements of Adolf Hitler (Autobahns, national health care, expanded support for the arts, etc...) but it would certainly be deeply, massively, hurtfully,  and profoundly insensitive to do so....

Cordoba House is the antithesis of al Qaeda's views and approach to Islam, not a monument to its ideals or an explanation of the good things al Qaeda accomplished. Islam is not defined by what al Qaeda did, nor should you cheer on the effort to crush or marginalize moderate Islam by misrepresenting Cordoba House. Osama bin Laden would bomb it if he could. I doubt Hitler would shut down a museum dedicated to his glory.

[Brittain33]

Given the totality of the situation, do you think the proposed location for the mosque is insensitive to the legitimate pain felt by 9/11 survivors, New York, and indeed much of the nation?

I question the assumption about "legitimate" pain, particularly on the part of people who are under the assumption it's being built at Ground Zero, that it is being built as a marker of conquest, and that its name connotes triumphalism. I do think people like Sarah Palin and Newt Gingrich are acting out of political expediency and because they see an opportunity to gin up support for fundraising, not because they are suffering emotional pain. I find many Americans' anger at all things Islamic, bordering on paranoia, to have warped our policies as a country to an extent I can not agree with. I question the assumption that Muslims really can't build mosques anywhere that you couldn't build an adult bookstore, because anything else might cause people to be upset, because it implies as a country we don't really accept there are millions of Muslims living here with the freedom of worship. I question the utility of putting this to a vote--which it would lose in the Financial District and Manhattan, if not in the city as a whole, or in Alaska or suburban Atlanta or wherever else one can think of. That's where I stand. We're a better country than this and I have a strong aversion to people joining hands with Osama bin Laden, seeking to destroy the middle and to polarize the world around a holy war that he could never have provoked on his own.

[Brittain33]

If Cordoba House represents moderate Islam, transparency with respect to the sources of funding, the leadership behind construction, etc, should not be a problem - indeed would be totally consistent with with the teachings of "Islam" - a religion of peace...

yes?

I think they should be held to the same standards of transparency as any organization building a major project in a major U.S. city, yes. I am not well-versed enough to know where demands for transparency cross the line into an effort to harass or intimidate a group and make it impossible for them to build, as critics have made hay from the most ridiculous connections (someone's wife's uncle belonging to a mosque whose website links to another website that links to Hamas, for example) to win the media war. I'm sure that's a concern of yours--not to use the letter of the law to invalidate the spirit, or to achieve harassment. Right?

[Brittain33]

Do you think the Cordoba Project (look up "Cordoba" in the context of Islamic History BTW)

I learned about it in Hebrew School. It was one of the few bright spots in Jewish history, particularly on the European continent.

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I am not familiar with the current degree of transparency, but I see a total lack of good faith in the media vanguard of people who oppose Cordoba House... they aren't asking for transparency in funding alone, which would be fair, they're sliming the project's very identity. There are people who don't want see mosques built anywhere other than, perhaps, some inner city slums they don't care about. They reject the idea of an Islamic cultural center. I think the organizers of Cordoba House could have done a better job of PR, but I don't think they'd be given any quarter and can't be responsible for the failure of bridge building when it's the other side that isn't interested at all. I just hope that Bloomberg stands firm.

[Brittain33]

I don't know why they chose to build their Islamic center in that very location. Perhaps that was the best spot? Consider that the building that will be torn down to build the center was damaged during the attacks and hasn't really been used since. I am sure it wasn't very expensive to buy.

I'm sure the fact that the area has been a tough sell for private real estate since 9/11 has been a factor. People rarely mention that the financial district is still, well, the financial district and there are plenty of Muslims working in that industry along with people of other religions.

[Brittain33]

Congrats on getting someone to take the bait the second time.

a building that the landing gear of a 9/11 plane

If it was put out of commission nine years ago and nothing had been done with it since then, and not because of interest groups and committees like at the real Ground Zero, this shows that the Burlington Coat Factory isn't quite as valuable or prominent as the Temple Mount, wouldn't you say?

[Brittain33]

I'm not entirely sure what a "victory mosque" is. Explain?

Think of the Mosque on the temple mount, in Constantinople, etc.

A mosque in a major city?

Yes, that's what he meant

Xahar is too young to recall the Palestinians dancing in the streets, celebrating the destruction of the Burlington Coat Factory.

[Brittain33]

So what?

I'm sure you think the answer to that is obvious, but I'm curious to hear it spelled out. Someone gave money to a group that gave money to Hamas in the 1990s in the guise of helping Palestinians in material ways. Now he's giving money to support Park51. Why does it matter? I'll bet he donated heavily to George W. Bush's campaign in 2000, too, like most wealthy Arab-Americans and Muslims who trusted the Bushs, supported Republican policies, and feared Joe Lieberman's influence. (As a gay Jew, I'm a staunch opponent of Hamas, FWIW.)

It is a fact that affluent Muslims who are active in funding Muslim institutions in this country, were probably also likely to identify with the Palestinian cause and fund that as well. Before 9/11, there wasn't really any problem with that as long as they weren't helping actual terrorists, knowingly. It wasn't a mainstream view, and was outside the view of Congress, but most people didn't really care. Since 9/11 there's this belief that we're at war with Muslims everywhere. It's not tenable in the long run but this makes for political problems that don't actually hold water.

[Brittain33]

Here are his campaign donations. I'm presuming this is unedited although the URL isn't encouraging.

http://www.newsmeat.com/fec/bystate_detail.php?last=Elzanaty&first=Hisham

Looks he gave to a Republican House candidate because he was an Arab (that guy was a nothing in the primary), to Democratic frontrunners after they effectively won their primaries (Clinton, Obama, Gillibrand), and to Cynthia McKinney and Lyndon LaRouche (!).

[Brittain33]

The group he gave money was shut down by the feds and the people were jailed.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holy_Land_Foundation_for_Relief_and_Development

Isn't that worrisome in the least? I understand your point about it was common, hell I have family who gave money to the PLO a long time ago, that doesn't make it right however.

Yeah, the group looks bad. I wonder how much people who donated knew where the money was going--it's unclear from the link and my memory from when it happened was that they presented themselves to donors as helping people with food and medicine etc. Given that this guy donated to LaRouche, all bets are off as to whether he has any sense or restraint about his donations.

What doesn't worry me is using this guy's donating money to one group as significant with regard to his giving money to another, unless he was on a board of directors for the Islamic center, or unless he was actively involved in the HLF. But it's an effective headline for Fox to run with in the service of its greater cause, certainly.

I keep thinking about the parallels with supporting NORAID and the IRA but I don't know how far that gets you. I don't think anyone would care if someone who gave a lot of money to NORAID in the 1980s also donated heavily to build a Catholic church or religious center later, but there are clear reasons why no one would care.