Just Next Door

27 December 2009

There was an article that appeared on 17 December 2009 in the WorldNetDaily web site reporting that a mosque is to open in New York just few steps away from Ground Zero.
The mosque will be part of an Islamic Cultural Center that imam Feisal Abdul Rauf is planning to establish in a five story building just two blocks away from the site where the World Trade Center stood. The building is so close that on September 11, 2001 the landing gear of one of the planes crushed into the WTC fell through the roof. The building has been vacant since that day, so the owners were more than willing to sell the property to a group of investors of which Rauf is member.
According to reports, Rauf is the founder of ASMA or American Society for Muslim Advancement and he has been conducting Muslim sensitivity training for the FBI New York office.
During the sessions, Rauf would speak of the misunderstanding that the West has about Islam and about the backlash that Muslims suffered from after the 9-11 attacks.

Mr. Rauf also, in 2004, spoke in Australia about the guilt America and the West should recognize for the mass murder of civilians throughout history and he asserts that Christians, and especially American Christians, should declare their culpability and responsibility in the development of terrorism.
According to Rauf, the Koran does not incite its followers to commit murder or mayhem, but he points an accusatory finger at America for the responsibility of terrorism. Basically America asked for it, which is an inherent apology for those who, according to Rauf, misinterpret the Koran and its teachings. In the view of this man, terrorism cannot and will not be eliminated as long as America does not acknowledge its guilt in the treatment of Muslims, citing how it was American Christians who perpetrated civilian mass murder in WWII bombings like Dresden and Hiroshima (of course it is problematic to see the connection between Dresden or Hiroshima with the Muslim world, but one cannot be too particular when pushing one’s own agenda).

It is even clearer now that the approach the Obama administration has taken toward the Muslim world is somewhat in line with the assertions of Mr. Rauf, as the President and those serving him have gone to extreme lengths to appease and apologize to the followers of Islam.

In his speech in Cairo to the Muslim world, Mr. Obama said the following:

“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.”

An enhanced understanding of Islam is certainly a step forward in the achievement of a world free of terrorism, provided that the “moderate voices” of Islam are able to eliminate the preaching of hate that some sects of Islam are disseminating to their fanatical followers. Even if Mr. Rauf is applying the typical Liberal approach of “he made me do it!”, the world is not a kindergarten and shifting blame to make oneself less culpable is not going to impress me.
There is really nothing new or captivating in the words of an elitist like Rauf that could change the fact that one cannot condemn an act of violence at the same time apologizing for it.

Then there is the truly disturbing aspect of having a Muslim cultural center two blocks away from the place where 19 Muslim terrorist were able to kill almost 3,000 innocent people. Maybe it’s just me, but the idea of having a place where the ideology that drove the terrorist to fly airplanes full of civilians into buildings full of civilians is taught next door to the place where they achieved their nefarious victory, is somewhat in bad taste. To me it is the equivalent of having an Imperial Japan Cultural Center in Nanking in 1944, or a Nazi Cultural Center just outside Dachau in 1952. It just is in horrible taste.

I do not blame Rauf or his followers for their actions. Islam is, in my opinion, a fascist ideology masqueraded as a religion, for the sole purpose of spreading their oppressive tentacles on as much territory and as many people as possible. What Mr. Rauf and people like him are doing, is to take advantage of conditions created by the Politically Correct cancer that has pervaded the West. Europe is already on its way to a radical overtaking, and the United States are on their way too. And people like Rauf are riding the PC wave with expertise and patience. Small steps will remain under the radar, even if big steps, like this Muslim Cultural Center next door to Ground Zero, will cause some people to pause.

I saw or heard nothing about this endeavor in New York, surely because nobody has the courage to stand up and say anything for fear of being labeled intolerant.
Not all German people were Nazi in 1933 when Adolf Hitler became Chancellor of Germany. Not all Germans were Nazi when he dragged a whole country and the world into a disastrous war, or when millions of people just started disappearing. But by the time those Germans who were not Nazi realized the abyss Hitler had taken them, it was too late to do anything about it.
Hitler too had campaigned and won his elections on the promise of change to the German people.

And it is happening just next door.

And these are my thoughts!
Frank “Semperpapa”