A 'mega mosque' near Ground Zero?

Plans are moving forward for a Muslim community center near the twin towers site. Is it a sign of tolerance — or a '13-story monument' to the horrors of 9/11?

A protester rallies against a mosque to be built near Ground Zero
(Image credit: Getty)

What Newsweek calls "predictable" outrage erupted earlier this week as members of a Manhattan community board backed the construction of a 13-story mosque and Islamic cultural center two blocks from Ground Zero. While some say the worship center, promoted by well-known moderate imam named Feisal Abdul Rauf, represents a symbol of tolerance and triumph over Islamic extremists, others see it as an affront to the memories of 9/11's victims. Is the plan doomed? (Watch an ABC report about the mosque near Ground Zero)

Put a mosque anywhere else, but not on this soil: Sorry, says Jeff Harrell in Staten Island Live, "there's just no room for a mosque at Ground Zero." America was founded, in part, "on the freedom to pray whenever, wherever, and whoever you want to pray to as long as nobody gets hurt in the process." But the fact remains that 3,000 Americans were murdered in the name of Allah. The plan to celebrate the mosque's grand opening on the atrocity's 10th anniversary is offensive. "Rauf can take his new discourse and shove it."

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