I don't object to the proposed mosque near the former World Trade Center

Submitted by Avi Morris (United States), Sep 12, 2010 at 22:09

My name is Avraham (Avi) Morris. I am an Orthodox Jew who has a huge interest in foreign affairs. I was a first-hand witness to the terror bombing of the World Trade Center on 9/11/2001, from 5 or 6 blocks away. I saw the first building (the south building) in flames; I saw the second (north) building struck, and saw the flames explode out of the other side of the building, opposite the side struck by the hijacked airliner; we were evacuated from our offices when the south building collapsed; and I was subsequently at a perfect angle for an unobstructed view of the collapse of the north building. I eventually walked out of Manhattan over the Williamsburg Bridge.

I don't think that the basic issue here is any "triumphalist theology" in the Moslem world. I see it much more as an issue of bigotry and bias where Islam is concerned. The 9/11 terror bombings were perpetrated by 17 crazies who happened to be from Saudi Arabia and who happened to be Moslem. However, all the Iraqi, Pakistani and Afghan soldiers who have been killed on our behalf since then, and all the civilians massacred by the Taliban for allegedly religious reasons, have also been Moslem. In Indonesia, the largest Moslem country in the world, the authorities are busily hunting down and shooting or imprisoning their own home-grown jihadists--in part to protect foreign, non-Moslem tourists. Ayman al-Zawahiri, #2 man in al Qaeda, recently put a price on Saudi King Abdullah's head. Iraqi Moslems risked their lives as guides and translators for the US Armed Forces in Iraq.

I think all these factors should have been taken into account before talking about "triumphalist theologies".

Thank you.

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