Lessons from 9/11? What Lessons?

by Dennis Prager

In attempting to understand 9/11, the first question asked by the world's elites -- as exemplified by leading media and academics -- was, "What did America do to provoke such hatred?"

Ten years later, the same people are still asking the same question. And it is as morally repulsive now as it was then. It was always on par with "What did the Jews do to antagonize the Germans?" or "What did blacks do to enrage lynch mobs?"

As long as people keep asking what America did to incite such hate, nothing will have been learned from 9/11.

The Sept. 11 terrorist attacks occurred because of a law of human life that has been true since Cain killed Abel: The worst hate the best (and the second best and the third best and so on). Evil hates good.

The United States of America is a flawed society. As it comprises human beings, it must be flawed. But in terms of the goodness achieved inside its borders and spread elsewhere in the world, it has been the finest country that ever existed. If you were to measure the moral gulf between America and those who despise it, the divide would have to be calculated in light-years.

If the academic and opinion elites of the world had moral courage, they would have asked the most obvious question provoked by 9/11: Were the mass murderers who flew those airplanes into American buildings an aberration or a product of their culture?

As far as those elites are concerned, only the first explanation exists. The 19 monsters of 9/11 were, for all intents and purposes, freaks. They were exceptions, no more representative of the Arab or Islamic worlds than serial killer Jeffrey Dahmer was of America. According to the elites, the hijackers happened to be Muslim -- only in name, we have been constantly reassured -- but were not produced by anything within Arab or Islamic society. Even to ask whether anything in those worlds produced the 9/11 terrorists -- or Britain's 7/7 terrorists, or Madrid's March 2004 terrorists, or Palestinian terrorists, or the Taliban, or Hamas -- is to be a bigot, or an "Islamophobe," the ingenious post-9/11 label to describe anyone who merely asks such questions.

It can be said, therefore, that not only has the world learned nothing from 9/11; it has been prohibited from learning anything.

The Muslim regime of Iran violently represses its people and (along with the Muslims of Hamas and of Hezbollah) vows to exterminate the nation of Israel. Muslim mobs murdered innocent people because of cartoons in Denmark. The Muslims of the Taliban throw acid in the faces of girls who attend school. Muslim mobs kill Christians and burn churches in Iraq, Egypt, Nigeria and elsewhere. And we are told that the mere mention of these facts is an act of bigotry.

After 9/11, the normal and decent question that normal and decent people -- people who fully and happily recognize the existence of vast numbers of normal and decent Muslims in the world -- would have posed is this: What has happened in the Arab world and parts of the Muslim world?

But as this, the most obvious question that 9/11 prompted, has not been allowed to be asked, what lessons can possibly be learned?

The answer is, of course, none.

But that has not stopped our media and academic elites from drawing lessons.

And what are those lessons? One is that America -- not the Islamic world -- must engage in moral introspection. The other is that we must oppose all expressions of religious extremism -- Jewish and Christian as well as Muslim, since, according to the Left, America's conservative Christians are as much a threat to humanity as are extremist Muslims.

Perhaps the best-known exponent of these non-lessons has been Karen Armstrong, the widely read religious thinker and former nun. She was invited to give a presentation on compassion at the nation's religious memorial service this past Sunday. And what was her message?

"9/11 was a revelation of the dangerous polarization of our world; it revealed the deep suspicion, frustration and rage that existed in some quarters of the Muslim world and also the ignorance and prejudice about Islam and Middle Eastern affairs that existed in some quarters of the West ..."

There you have it: Muslims have rage and deep suspicion; the West has ignorance and prejudice.

If that's what the world learns from 9/11, those who died that day died in vain.



Town Hall

9/11 Science and Conspiracy

Here is National Geographic 9-11 Science and Conspiracy video. The documentary of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks proves the false conspiracy theories.

With the use of high-tech forensic experiments, eyewitness footage, CGI re-creations, and an in-depth analysis by experts and theorists on all sides of the story, the documentary attempts to examine both alleged conspiracies and available evidence.

The documentary, National Geographic 9-11 Science and Conspiracy sets out to conduct a forensic investigation designed to test various tenets of some common 9-11 conspiracy theories. What caused the collapse of the Twin Towers? Was it from the fires, or were explosives placed inside the buildings, causing them to implode? Did a missile, rather than a commercial airline jet strike the Pentagon?

CONSPIRACY VS. SCIENCE

Conspiracy theories are put to the test. How well do they stand up against the visual simulations of professional engineers? See how science supports official stories and debunks the conspiracies below.

THE COLLAPSE OF THE BUILDINGS

Official Story: The collapse was caused by fire initially fed by the jet fuel from the planes.
Testing the Official Story: Using original construction blueprints, photographs, and construction data, Purdue University, along with the American Society of Civil Engineers, created a model structure of the north World Trade Center tower and a scaled 767 jetliner. To model the fuel load, Purdue launched aluminum cans filled with liquid to represent an airline wing colliding with a steel column. The final simulation showed the internal destruction of supporting columns, the disintegration of the jetliner, the atomizing of the fuel, and the resulting fires that softened the steel framework of the building and brought it down.

Conspiracy: The fire could not have gotten hot enough to melt the steel.
Science: The Energetic Materials Research and Testing Center (EMRTC) designed explosives to test the effects of burning jet fuel on steel. EMRTC used a bare steel beam because the National Institute of Standards and Technology reports that much of the any fireproofing material would have been knocked off at the moment of impact. Within two minutes of igniting the fuel, the temperature peaked just above 2,000 Fahrenheit and complete structural failure occurred in less than four minutes.

Conspiracy: The collapse was caused by controlled demolition.
Science: The film crew recorded the demolition of a college dormitory building to learn all that is involved in the process of prepping and loading. The first step was to expose the columns in order to attach explosives to them. The World Trade Center had 47 inner core columns that would have needed to be prepared. To cut the steel beams the demolition team used a shape charge, which is piece of copper apportioned to a shape-charged weapon. When an explosive is attached and ignited, the device implodes and forms a stream of liquid copper that cuts through the steel. A demolition of this scale would leave clear evidence behind, but no such traces were found at Ground Zero.

Conspiracy: Thermite, which is less traceable, was used in the controlled demolition that brought down the towers.
Science: Some Truthers claim that pulverized dust found by some New Yorkers after the attack contained the chemical signature of thermite. Scientists assert that even if this dust did contain thermite, it would be impossible to determine whether the thermite came from a controlled demolition or simply from the melting of the airplanes. EMRTC designed an experiment to see if thermite was a plausible option in the collapse of the towers. The thermite in the test was not even able to melt a column much smaller than those in the World Trade Center.

THE ATTACK ON THE PENTAGON

Official Story: Hijackers caused a commercial airplane to crash into the building.
Testing the Official Story: Purdue University created a visual simulation of the crash, which indicated the victims’ bodies would have been pushed forward in relation to one another, just as they were in the actual attack. To further investigate, EMRTC launched a projectile into a simulated structure. They did not include wings in the projectile model because Purdue asserted they were of little consequence as the Pentagon was so heavily reinforced. The experiment created a hole in the structure the approximate size of the projectile - similar to photo evidence from the actual attack.

Conspiracy: The Pentagon was either bombed or hit by a missile.
Science: EMRTC also planted an explosive in the same model structure and compared the results to photos of the Pentagon after the crash. The explosive test demonstrated a different sort of damage. The structure blew out from the point of the explosion, causing complete destruction of floors and walls. This dispersed debris did not match the photo evidence.

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By: National Geographic

Is Islam the Problem?

Asking tough questions about problematic aspects of Islam isn’t ‘Islamophobic’
By Moshe Dann

Supporters of building a mosque and huge Islamic center near ground zero have focused the issue on religious freedom. Since thousands of mosques have already been built throughout America, however, this can't be the issue.

Its location is sensitive because of the 9/11 attack by Muslim terrorists. But no one is accusing all Muslims of being guilty of this crime. This project, however, has become a rallying cry of pain, a howl of grief that every Muslim should hear.

Opposition to this project echoes 3,000 silent screams. That outrage needs to focus not only on the memory of lost loved ones, but on why so many Muslims are terrorists, and support terrorism. We need to ask some hard questions; and, it is not "Islamophobic" to ask.

Is Islam a "religion of peace," as President Obama and others say?
According to experts, suicide bombing ("martyrdom") and Jihad ("holy war") are not radical ideas in Islam; they are intrinsic parts of that belief.

Conventional wisdom says that there are radical Muslims and moderate Muslims, and that we must distinguish between the two groups and encourage those who don't want to destroy non-Muslims and their cultures.

No doubt, most Muslims don't want to fly airplanes into buildings, or blow up supermarkets and buses. But what does Islam say, and who is the authority? The problem seems to be that Islam contains both radical and moderate traditions, and both are authentic. Fanatic Jihadists and soft-spoken moderates consider themselves good Muslims; Muslim religious leaders are divided.

The leader of the proposed mosque/Islamic center in downtown Manhattan claims he is tolerant, and has suggested that the project may even include space for other religions, as if Christians and Jews would want to pray there. But this seems to be just another PR trick, since it violates strict separation mandated in the Koran, and also denies Muslim superiority. It is impossible, therefore, to know what kind of Islam will be taught there, or for how long.

Controversy over the building must move to a critical examination of Islam's theology, beliefs and practices.

Not very peaceful; not so tolerant
Why are Islamic leaders silent about stoning a woman to death because she was accused of adultery – then lashed 99 times when the charge was proved false? Why are Islamic leaders silent about the suppression of women, condoning slavery, the murder of homosexuals, and suicide bombings throughout the world? Where were they when violent Muslim riots engulfed Europe because of a cartoon?

Perhaps a few brave Muslims protested such barbarity, but whom do they represent and what is their authority? The fundamental problem in Islam is its principle of duality; it holds contradictory positions on many issues, both of which are valid.

Muslim leaders refuse to condemn the murder of Jews by Muslims – anywhere – especially not in Israel. Four Israelis (and one unborn child) were slaughtered on the road in Israel two weeks ago and no Muslim leader – not even moderates – protested. Even the secular PA did not condemn the attack as murder; only that it was against "Palestinian interests." The "timing" was wrong!

Islam preaches war against "infidels" and violence against those who don't follow the rules of Islam. That's not very peaceful. And Muslim leaders around the world encourage anti-Americanism – as well as hostility to Christians and Jews. Not so tolerant.

Despite extensive business dealings between Muslims and non-Muslims, many Muslim religious leaders foment a culture of hatred and violence. The problem is that they quote scripture and verse. And they are supported by a legal system.

Sharia (Islamic) Law mandates violent Jihad as a religious obligation, and extreme punishments for those who insult Islam, or violate its precepts. Moreover, since there is no central authority in Islam and there are conflicting factions, it is difficult to determine who makes these laws, and how they should be applied.

Where does Islam stand on terrorism, for example? Well, it depends on your definition – if you have one. As they say: "One man's terrorist …"

We need to know what Islam is. The failure to answer these fundamental questions lies behind the distrust of Muslims and suspicions about what Islam teaches. The crucial distinctions, therefore, may not be between "moderates" and "radicals," but those who are more radical than others – since they all use the same source, the Koran. With so many people in positions of authority, no one is, and it's chaos.

These questions need to be clarified.

We should be tolerant, open and respectful, but not stupid. That's why we keep asking!

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Ynet News

Build This Mosque or Face the Wrath of Radical Islamists

TREATS, THREATS, THREATS and more THREATS and we run like chickens with their heads cut off to please them (The world upside down - I just had a glance at CNN is trashing the Loony Pastor; but CNN said nothing about the insensitivity of the NYC Cordoba house)

"If we move from that location, the story will be the radicals have taken over the discourse, the headlines in the Muslim world will be that Islam is under attack. Our national security now hinges on how we negotiate this, how we speak about it. The battlefront is between moderates of all sides... and the radicals on all sides," he said.

Moving the project to another location would strengthen Islamist radicals' ability to recruit followers and will likely increase violence against Americans, the imam said.

On CNN's "Larry King," Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf confirmed everything we've thought about him.

While the left continues to be romanced by his calm, even, and soothing tones, he personally raises the rhetoric to new and foreboding heights with every television appearance justifying his plan to build a 13-story mosque at ground zero.

In an interview with guest host Soledad O'Brien, the Imam laid out his latest argument for the American people and his words can have only one meaning: Build this mosque or face the wrath of radical Islamists. LOL LOL

The man who continues to talk about healing and building bridges has thrown down the gauntlet. He created this entire situation by demanding that his mega-mosque be built in this exact location, despite the legitimate concerns of families of lost heroes whom he claims to care about. And now that the opposition of this mosque has fully engaged and has successfully swayed a vast majority of Americans to their side, he tells an international audience that if his plans don't go forward, America's national security will be at risk.

It could be that the Imam's threats, delivered in calm even tones, might end up doing more for the case against his mosque than any rally in the streets could ever do. And given Mr. Rauf's knowledge of the irrational and violent nature of the most radical practitioners of his faith, one has to challenge his judgement in even proposing this project in the first place.

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America's Move to Islam

NYC where this is done daily!!!!

We cannot say prayers in schools, or at football games, etc. and yet we allow the Muslims to drop their prayer rugs in the middle of NYC streets and pray to Allah for hours!!!! This has gone way too far for me. They stop traffic to do this.

This is an accurate picture of every Friday afternoon in several locations throughout NYC where there are mosques with a large number of Muslims that cannot fit into the mosque - They fill the surrounding streets, facing east for a couple of hours between about 2 & 4 p.m. - Besides this one at 42nd St & Madison Ave, there is another, even larger group, at 94th St & 3rd Ave, etc., etc. - Also, I presume, you are aware of the dispute over building another "high rise" Mosque a few blocks from "ground zero" - With regard to that one, the "Imam" refuses to disclose where the $110 million dollars to build it is coming from and there is a lawsuit filed to force disclosure of that information - November can't come soon enough!

This is in New York City on Madison Avenue, not in France or the Middle East or Yemen or Kenya.

Islamic Trojan Horse at Ground Zero

By Sam Blumenfeld

Islamic Global Jihad declared war against America on September 11, 2001, in an attack that killed nearly 3000 Americans in the Twin Towers in Manhattan, the Pentagon in Washington, D.C., and in four hijacked airliners. Had the fourth airliner succeeded in reaching Washington, it might have crashed into the White House or the Capitol with even more loss of life. But, thanks to the brave passengers on the plane, the attack was thwarted and the plane crashed in a field in Pennsylvania.

Anyone who has watched videos of ordinary men and women jumping out of the Twin Towers to their deaths will never forget the horror perpetrated by Islamic jihadists on that day. The attack took months of intricate, detailed planning by the terrorists, but our government was simply too inept to prevent it from happening.

Meanwhile, Muslims around the world danced in the streets at their great victory over America and their spectacular advance in the war against the West. The goal of the Jihad is to impose the Islamic religion and Sharia law over the entire world, and the attack on 9/11 was just the visible tip of the iceberg in what has been and will be a very long war.

For example, there is an Islamic missionary organization active throughout the world in recruiting converts to Islam. It is called Tablighi Jamaat, and according to reliable sources, it is estimated that about 15,000 of its missionaries are active in the United States. It is particularly active among Black Muslims and criminals in our prisons.

And so, while American soldiers are fighting and dying in Afghanistan against the jihadist enemy, the enemy is quietly subverting the American homeland with virtually no resistance from the American people.

It should be reminded that Islam is a totalitarian, genocidal political movement operating under the guise of a peace-loving religion. It is intolerant of other religions and despises the governing principles of the United States. Islam does not believe in the separation of church and state, as clearly demonstrated by the regime in Iran. Yet President Obama refuses to acknowledge that we are at war against Global Jihad or even radical Islamic terrorism. Terrorism, by the way, is just one of the means the war is being fought against the West.

And this Global Jihad is being fought by bombing trains in Madrid, bombing subways and buses in London, bombing a night club in Bali, attempted airplane bombings by the shoe bomber and the Christmas underwear bomber, an attempted bombing in Times Square, the murder of 13 soldiers at Fort Hood by a jihadist in uniform, suicide bombings in Israel, the murder of a cinematographer in Holland, the beheading of an American journalist kidnapped in Pakistan, bombings and massacres in India, Indonesia and Uganda, the killing of Christians and burning of churches in Pakistan, Kenya, and elsewhere. There is no end to the atrocities being committed by jihadists. In the U.S. a Muslim father killed his daughter because she was becoming too Americanized.

So it should not take a political genius to figure out why the Muslims want to build a mosque at Ground Zero. They want to commemorate and honor those jihadists who died crashing those planes into the Twin Towers. Where better to honor them than at Ground Zero? And not just an ordinary mosque, but a 13-story, $100-million mosque. The developer of the project is Feisal Abdul Rauf, born in Kuwait of Egyptian parents with a known adherence to Islamic radicalism.

Rauf was brought to America at the age of 17 by his parents when his father moved from Malaysia to the U.S. to set up the Islamic Cultural Center in Washington, D.C. Rauf then got a BS in physics at Columbia University. In 1997, Rauf established the American Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA) with funding from Gloria Steinem’s Ms. Foundation, New York Carnegie Corporation, U.N. Population Fund, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, and Hunt Alternatives Fund.

The project is significantly called the Cordoba Initiative, to commemorate the return of Islam to Spain where it was expelled in 1492. According to Raymond Ibrahim, the Christian city of Cordoba “was conquered by Muslims around 711, its inhabitants slaughtered or enslaved. The original mosque of Cordoba — the namesake of the Ground Zero mosque — was built atop, and partly from the materials of, a Christian church. Modern day Muslims are well aware of all this. Such is the true — and ominous — legacy of Cordoba. More pointedly, throughout Islam's history, whenever a region was conquered, one of the first signs of consolidation was/is the erection of a mosque atop the sacred sites of the vanquished.”

The Ground Zero mosque plan is akin to a project initiated by Rauf's late father in 1965. That year, Muhammad R. Abdul Rauf came to New York to plan the construction of an Islamic Cultural Center that took many years to complete.. He bought prime Manhattan real estate at 96th Street and 3rd Avenue, where a huge mosque was built, with funding from Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and Libya.

The mosque at Ground Zero will contain a community center and will draw thousands of Muslims to worship at the very site where 3,000 innocent men and women were murdered by their brave, dedicated jihadist martyrs. It will have a swimming pool and a basketball court to attract the young, an auditorium and culinary school, a library, art studios, and meditation rooms. But it will still symbolize not only a glorious Islamic victory, but also the impending surrender of America to Islam. It will also have a “memorial” dedicated to the victims of the 9/11 attacks, which makes the project even more odious, hypocritical, and dangerous. After all, it will be easy enough to claim the perpetrators of the crime as “victims” of an unjust West.

That Americans are willing to permit this Trojan Horse to be built in what is now considered hallowed ground, where so many men and women lost their lives in the worst terrorist attack visited on America, should make us realize how weakened America has become in this life and death struggle under the Obama regime in Washington.

According to Salah Choudhury, a journalist and author, who has exposed the work and motives of Feisel Abdul Rauf: “Rauf's early UK education and familiarization with American popular culture and values made him an acutely adept practitioner of Islamic taqiyya — deceptive speech and action to advance the interests and supremacy of Islam…. Now, Imam Rauf is set to construct his dream project, wherefrom possibly the radical Islamists will start Islamization of America. This will not be a mere mosque, but a tower of terrorism to further flex the muscle of militant Islam right inside the heart of United States.”

Liberals like Mayor Bloomberg of New York, who seems to live in a fantasy world, use the argument of freedom of religion to approve the construction of the mosque at Ground Zero. They do not accept that we are at war with Global Jihad which is determined to destroy us. Somehow, they are not aware that the U.S. Constitution is not a suicide pact. But maybe Bloomberg believes that that Muslims have a Constitutional right to Islamicize America and destroy our Judeo-Christian heritage in the name of religious freedom. I wonder what he would say if Christians decided to erect a giant cross at Ground Zero or if Jews wanted to erect a giant Star of David or a replica of the Ten Commandments at Ground Zero.

There is no doubt that if the mosque is built, Ground Zero will become the center of daily religious and political conflict with competing demonstrations, speakers, pamphlet distributions, and even violence. The resentment against the mosque is so great among ordinary Americans that it may well inspire greater resistance to this blatant Islamic plan to conquer America.

Meanwhile, it is hoped that enough New Yorkers rise up against this evil project and kill it before it becomes the focus of hatred and dread, an arrogant, brutal affront to the men and women who died at Ground Zero.

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The New America

On Whose Side is Obama?

President Obama owes every American apology over handling of mosque affair
By: Moshe Dann

President Obama's defense of the right of Muslims to build a mosque and Islamic center in New York City turned the issue into one of religious freedom. That was wrong.

Obama's first priority - like that of every national leader - is to speak for his country and on its behalf. Obama's refusal to do so, his insinuation that questions raised about a proposed Islamic mega-center near the site of the 9/11 attacks are un-American, unconstitutional, and prejudiced have shamed every American, and the good name of America.

Obama could have defended America; instead, he apologized for it.

He could have said that 4,400 Americans have died in Iraq, 1,200 have died in Afghanistan, and hundreds of thousands of Americans have been wounded - to help those Muslim countries attain freedom. And of course, hundreds of billions of dollars were spent towards that effort. But he didn't.

Obama might have said that Islam is the fastest growing religion in the US; hundreds of thousands of Muslims have found a home in America since and despite 9/11. He could have said: America has and continues to stand for freedom and democracy. He did not.

He is probably the first American president to malign his own country.

Obama could have explained that American law and values do not support discrimination, certainly not against Muslims; our history proves that. There are about 2,000 mosques in the United States, serving about 8 million Muslims; NYC alone has a dozen mosques. And Muslims are doing well in America: 67% have higher degrees; their average income is over $42,000; 26% earn over $100,000; 67% buy a new car every 3 years.

President Obama could have also noted that most American Muslims don't attend prayer services; mosques are often political and social centers, some of which are problematic.

'Grave threat to non-Muslims’
According to FBI estimates, 10 % of the mosques in the United States are associated with radical Jihadist ideology. Others estimate that 80% of mosques are dominated by the extremist Wahhabi ideology promoted by Saudi Arabia. And they are allowed to practice, under American principles of freedom of religion.

Unlike houses of worship in America which are built and supported by the local population, most mosques receive funding from foreign countries, especially Saudi Arabia.

President Obama might have noted that the Muslim Brotherhood, a Nazi organization that is banned in Egypt, is associated with some American mosques.

A study by Freedom House concluded that American mosques offer a wide selection of Saudi publications that promote hateful ideology, with all materials found to have some connection to Saudi Arabia.

According to the study, these publications advanced a "dualistic worldview in which there exist two antagonistic realms or abodes that can never be reconciled. The study also concluded that these publications "pose a grave threat to non-Muslims and to the Muslim community itself."

President Obama could have explained that this is obviously not an issue of religious freedom. He could have championed America, its reputation, institutions and values. Instead, he reinforced the view that America is bigoted.

For that, President Obama owes every American an apology.


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Ynet News

Ground Zero Mosque is the SECOND Mosque Being Built on a 9/11 Site

To our fellow 9/11 families and to all who are concerned about the Ground Zero mega-mosque in New York:

We want everyone to know that the Park Service is right now building an even larger Islamic victory mosque atop the Flight 93 crash site. Many of you were outraged in 2005 when the Crescent of Embrace design was unveiled to be a half-mile wide Islamic shaped crescent:

Left: 2005 publicity shot of the Crescent of Embrace design. Right: typical Islamic crescent and star, viewed from a similar angle.

Few people know that this giant crescent actually points to Mecca, or understand the religious significance of this orientation. A crescent that points the direction to Mecca is a very familiar construct in the Islamic world. Because Muslims face Mecca for prayer, every mosque is built around a Mecca direction indicator called a mihrab. The classic mihrab is crescent shaped. Here are the two most famous mihrabs in the world:

Left: the Mihrab of the Prophet, at the Prophet's mosque in Medina. Right: the mihrab of the Great Mosque in Cordoba Spain.

Face into the crescent to face Mecca

As with the Medina and Cordoba mihrabs, a person facing into the Crescent of Embrace will be facing Mecca. In the image below, superimposed red lines show the orientation of the Flight 93 crescent. The green qibla circle is from an nline Mecca-direction calculator:

A person standing between the tips of the crescent and facing into the center of the crescent (red arrow) will be facing almost exactly in "qibla" direction (the Muslim prayer direction). You can verify the qibla direction from Somerset PA using any number of on-line Mecca-direction calculators.

To be precise, the Crescent of Embrace points 1.8° north of Mecca, ± a tenth of a degree. The final construction drawings alter this orientation slightly, so that instead of pointing a little less than two degrees north of Mecca, the actual crescent will point less than three degrees south of Mecca. Such small deviations from Mecca are insignificant by Islamic standards, which developed over a period of more than a thousand years during which far flung Muslims had no accurate way to determine the direction to Mecca.

The Park Service does not call the Crescent of Embrace a crescent anymore. Now they call it Circle of Embrace, but the only actual change was to add an extra arc of trees (planted to the rear of a person facing into the giant crescent) that explicitly represents a broken off part of the circle. The unbroken part of the circle, what symbolically remains standing in the wake of 9/11, is just the original Crescent of Embrace. It is still a giant Islamic shaped crescent, still pointing at Mecca.

This is the Park Service's official explanation for the design: the terrorist attacks are depicted as smashing our peaceful circle and turning it into a giant crescent. A clearer depiction of Islamic victory is hard to imagine, so no one should be too surprised that the damned thing points to Mecca, and actually turns out to be a mosque.

Other mosque features:

Mosque design is based on a dozen typical mosque features, every one of which is realized in the Crescent/Circle design, all on the same epic scale as the half mile wide crescent-mihrab. Note, for instance, that the 93 foot tall minaret-like Tower of Voices is topped with another Islamic-shaped crescent, akin to the crescent-topped minarets seen in many Islamic countries:

An Islamic shaped crescent, soaring in the sky above the symbolic lives of the 40 heroes, which literally dangle down below. In Islam, there is only heaven and hell. Symbolic damnation?

The Flight 93 mosque needs to be stopped, along with the Islamic victory mosque at ground zero in Manhattan. May the fight against these two desecrations strengthen each other.

Sincerely,

Tom Burnett Senior
Loving father of Flight 93 hero Tom Burnett Junior

Contact information for the Flight 93 Memorial Project here:
Flight 93 National Memorial
109 W. Main St., Suite 104
Somerset, PA 15501
814.443.4557

If you would like to help stop the crescent mosque, please email Alec Rawls (alec@rawls.org) who is helping to coordinate opposition.

There is also an online petition that people can sign.

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By: Atlas Shrugs

The Moderate Muslim Threat

NY mosque affair another sign moderate Muslims more dangerous than radicals.

By: Shaul Rosenfeld





Muslims should build mosques “everywhere,” Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Zahar declared Tuesday as he addressed the plans to build a mosque near ground zero in New York. Most of his Muslim brethren, moderates and radicals alike, likely endorsed this sentiment. After all, when one of the pillars of Islam is its very dissemination, one should not wonder that even the “moderates” view ground zero as a suitable site for a mosque.

The fact that almost all global terror in recent years is carried out in the name of Islamic ideas being recited day and night at the finest mosques (both in the East and West,) and that almost 3,000 people were killed in New York in the name of these notions nine years ago should have elicited at least a hint of understanding for the feelings of the victims’ families on the part of Islamic moderates.

New York Governor David Patterson recently announced that Muslims refused his offer to find an alternate site for the new Islamic center. He may have forgotten for a moment that more than anything, the center and its name (The Cordoba House) are a symbol. Seemingly, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, Sharif el-Gamal and their partners could have scored quite a few points in America’s public opinion (which in all polls shows firm objection to the center’s establishment) had they accepted Patterson’s proposal.

After all, these distinguished gentleman fully realize that the various shades of Islam, even without the center, do not enjoy an especially positive image in US public opinion, and that a gesture conceding only the site of the mosque, rather than the principle of building it, was virtually a win-win situation for them. Moreover, their willingness to change the location would have ended almost at once the ongoing media and public debate on the actions of 19 of their Islamic brethren nine years ago and the thousands of their victims.

If, as Rauf and Gamal argue, the center’s main purpose is to encourage tolerance and promote interfaith dialogue, while showing maximal sensitivity to the feelings of others, would it not be natural to show a little more than zero tolerance and consideration for other people’s feelings, instead of dismissing out of hand many families of September 11 victims who ask that the mosque be built somewhere else?

The trap of Islamic rhetoric
An important part of the answer to the above questions has to do with the long-term goals designated by many of Islam’s spiritual and ideological leaders, both in the past and at present, both in the West and East. These objectives prompt many Muslim immigrants in the West (unlike any other immigrant group on earth) to strictly refrain from integrating into their new home and adopt local customs, even when this does not require them to make any religious concession.

In Britain, France, and the US, the separatist and anti-Western voices coming out of the mosques have no parallel among any other immigrant group. Even the economic, educational, and social opportunities and temptations, which are immeasurably greater than what is available at their home countries, only prompt a minority of Muslim immigrants to veer off the path outlined by Imams and integrate into the citizenry of their new country.

Moreover, this separatism is not undertaken for noble aims of course, but rather, mostly in order to gain a cultural, social, religious, and political foothold in their new address. This has always been Islam’s way. We would do well to examine the refusal of mosque planners to compromise on its location, even at the price of boosting the grievances against them among Americans, through this prism.

Yet in order to ensure that their work bears fruit, the senior Imams within the “moderate” Muslim camp excel at uttering words that are pleasantly received in the West. These imams can always put their trust in a variety of enlightened Western intellectuals, as well as some useful idiots, which this time around include New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and city council members, with the trusted support of Barack Obama (before he embarked on his zigzags.)

And so, we again see a noble, wonderful partnership between “moderate Muslims” committed to doublespeak and Western intellectuals who remain loyal to double standards; meanwhile, naïve souls all around are deeply moved by any “moderate” Islamic statement.

In his recently published book Flight of the Intellectuals, Paul Berman warns that the danger posed to the West by “moderate Muslims” is even greater than that posed by their radical brethren, mostly because too many people are happy to fall into the trap laid by moderate Islamic rhetoric, even when the conciliatory tone disappears the moment the target audiences changes to Muslims.

And so, for example, the Cordoba House is marketed to Westerners as a stronghold of tolerance, moderation, and interfaith dialogue. Yet in Islamic tradition, Cordoba is first and foremost a Christian Spanish city conquered by Muslims in 711, with many of its residents butchered or turned into slaves; a mosque built on the ruins of a church; and memories of the Almohads, the spiritual fathers of contemporary Islamic zealots.

The Almohads razed the town in the 12th Century and killed those who refused to convert to Islam, forcing Jews and Christians to either convert or go into exile. However, Feisal Abdul Rauf reserves this chapter in Cordoba’s history for his Muslims brethren only.


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Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf of Mosque at Ground Zero

Imam of Islamic supremacist mega-mosque at Ground Zero refuses to condemn Hamas.
I've been trying to tell you about this guy. You wouldn't listen. "Imam terror: Ground Zero mosque leader hedges on Hamas,"

The imam behind plans to build a controversial Ground Zero mosque yesterday refused to describe Hamas as a terrorist organization.

According to the State Department's assessment, "Hamas terrorists, especially those in the Izz al-Din al-Qassam Brigades, have conducted many attacks, including large-scale suicide bombings, against Israeli civilian and military targets."

Asked if he agreed with the State Department's assessment, Imam Faisal Abdul Rauf told WABC radio, "Look, I'm not a politician.

"The issue of terrorism is a very complex question," he told interviewer Aaron Klein.

"There was an attempt in the '90s to have the UN define what terrorism is and say who was a terrorist. There was no ability to get agreement on that."

Asked again for his opinion on Hamas, an exasperated Rauf wouldn't budge.

"I am a peace builder. I will not allow anybody to put me in a position where I am seen by any party in the world as an adversary or as an enemy," Rauf said, insisting that he wants to see peace in Israel between Jews and Arabs.

Note:
The Brotherhood openly seeks to spread Islam around the world, while Hamas is committed to Israelís destruction and is responsible for scores of suicide bombings, shootings and rocket attacks aimed at Jewish civilian population centers.

Rauf also would not answer a question about Egypt's outlawed Muslim Brotherhood.

"I have nothing to do with the Muslim Brotherhood. My father was never a member of the Muslim Brotherhood," he said, disputing a rumor....

Yeah, and I would continue to believe every word this man says...

FACTS:
A religion adviser to President Obama has close ties to the imam who wants to build a 13-story Islamic cultural center near Ground Zero. The two have been documented together discussing America as 'the ideal place for a renewal of Islam,' WND has learned.

In February, Obama named a Chicago Muslim, Eboo Patel, to his Advisory Council on Faith-based and Neighborhood Partnerships. Patel is the founder and executive director of Chicago-based Interfaith Youth Core, which says it promotes pluralism by teaming people of different faiths on service projects.

Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the controversial Muslim leader behind the plan to build the Islamic center and mosque two blocks from Ground Zero, wrote the afterword to Patelís 2006 book, 'Building the Interfaith Youth Movement: Beyond Dialogue to Action.'

Patel is listed as one of 15 ìMuslim Leaders of Tomorrowî on the website for the American Society for the Advancement of Muslims, or ASAM, which is led by Rauf.


In Patelís 2007 book, ìSaving Each Other, Saving Ourselves,î he recounts discussing with Rauf the future of Islam in the U.S.

Rauf ìunderstood the vision immediately and suggested that I visit him and his wife, Daisy Khan, at their home the following evening,î Patel recalled. Khan founded the ASAM with her husband and has aided him in his plans for the mosque near Ground Zero.

'The living room of their apartment on the Upper West Side was set up like a mosque, with prayer rugs stretched from wall to wall,' wrote Patel in his book.

Continued Patel: 'I arrived at dusk, prayed the maghrib prayer with Daisy and Imam Feisal and then talked with them about how America, with its unique combination of religious devotion and religious diversity, was the ideal place for a renewal of Islam.'

'Islam is a religion that has always been revitalized by its migration,' he wrote. 'America is a nation that has been constantly rejuvenated by immigrants. There is now a critical mass of Muslims in America.'

And Obama is making sure to grant emigrant visas to as many Muslim immigrants as possible, more than ever before.

Islam isnít in America to be equal to any other faiths, but to become dominant. The Koran, the Muslim book of scripture, should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth.î-- Omar Ahmad, co-founder of CAIR

America is a free country where you can build whatever you want -- but not anywhere. That's why we have zoning laws. No liquor store near a school, no strip malls where they offend local sensibilities, and, if your house doesn't meet community architectural codes, you cannot build at all.

Build it anywhere but there.



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Hamas: NYC Mosque Must Be Built

Palestinian terror group strongman Mahmoud al-Zahar says Muslims 'have to build everywhere,' including near site of 9/11 attacks, so that followers can pray just like Christians, Jews. US Senator: His words don't carry any weight




A Hamas leader says Muslims "have to build" a mosque near ground zero.

Mahmoud al-Zahar said Muslims "have to build everywhere" so that followers can pray, just like Christians and Jews build their places of worship.

Al-Zahar spoke Sunday on "Aaron Klein Investigative Radio" on WABC-AM. He is a co-founder of Hamas and its chief on the Gaza Strip.




Sen. Chuck Schumer says al-Zahar's comments don't carry any weight because Hamas is a terrorist organization. Schumer hasn't taken a stand on the mosque.

Rep. Peter King, who opposes the mosque, says he won't respond to Hamas.

The mosque is a project of the Cordoba Initiative, an advocacy group that promotes improved relations between Islam and the West. It didn't respond to al-Zahar's comments.

White House: Politics had no role in remarks
A White House spokesman said Sunday that politics was not a factor in President Barack Obama's remarks about building a mosque near the site of the September 11, 2001, attacks in New York City.

Deputy press secretary Bill Burton said it was "not politics" but Obama's feeling that he had the obligation as president to "make sure people are treated equally" under the US Constitution.

Obama has said that religious freedom allows the mosque to be built, but without commenting on the wisdom of building one two blocks from an area known as ground zero. Republicans have pounded him for his comments, making it a November election issue.

Burton said Obama "felt it was his obligation as president to address this." Obama was on a political trip to the state of Wisconsin.

Poster Note:
Mr. Mahmoud al-Zahar is a big liar!!!
There is no one synagogue in Saudi Arabia, nor church. Simple because the Muslims don't allowed to build pryer buildings on their soil but mosques. While the Muslims persecutes Christians in Egypt, Gaza, Indonesia, Philippines, etc... and Muslims are murdering Jews in Israel, Hindus in India and Buddhists in Thailand, they keeps preaching Islam and keeps trying to take over more land in the world to rule it under Islam and Sharia law.


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Ynet News

Obama and the Mosque

President's endorsement of Ground Zero mosque unwise but consistent with his worldview
By: Eytan Gilboa

Barack Obama's endorsement of the construction of a Muslim community center, including a mosque, two streets away from Ground Zero is commensurate with the president's worldview and his strategy for fighting Islamic terror.

Obama's worldview espouses historic reconciliation between the United States and the Muslims and Arab world; his strategy distinguishes between moderate Islam, which can be engaged in dialogue, and radical and violent Islam, which should be fought.

In order to realize this strategy, Obama delivered reconciliation speeches in Cairo and in Ankara at the beginning of his presidential term; he frequently talks about the need to avoid generalizations that position all Muslims in one anti-American camp.

The plan to establish the Muslim center ignited an emotional controversy. On the one hand we have the Muslims who seek to realize their right for freedom of religion and Jewish Mayor Michael Bloomberg who backed their request; on the other hand we have the victims' families and an overwhelming majority of New Yorkers who object to establishing the center so close to Ground Zero, where radical Muslims demolished the Twin Towers and killed about 3,000 civilians.

At a dinner on the occasion of Ramadan, Obama used the opportunity to take a position and endorsed the plan. After sustaining criticism from all directions he took a step back and attempted to argue that he merely intended to endorse freedom of religion, rather than the specific plan. Yet this clarification is deceptive.

We are not dealing with religious freedom here. Nobody prevents Muslims from building mosques in the US. The problem pertains to the establishment of a Muslim center close to Ground Zero. The families of victims argue that building the mosque would hurt their feelings while most New Yorkers feel the plan rubs salt on their wounds. Had the Muslims offered to build the center in another area of New York, nobody would disapprove.

Obama's strategy utter failure
The war over the mosque erupted a few weeks ahead of the elections for Congress. Obama's Republican rivals were quick to exploit the opportunity and slammed him harshly. Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich compared the building of a mosque near Ground Zero to the placement of a Nazi swastika near the Holocaust museum.

Democratic politicians also disapproved of Obama's statements. Why did he step into a confrontation that was local in nature thus far, making a statement that may prompt more voters to shun his party?

The answer has to do with ideological and strategic devotion. This is what Obama thinks, and he usually says what he thinks. His supporters argue that establishing the center in Ground Zero would contribute to the war on Islamic terrorists and al-Qaeda by bringing moderate Muslims closer. Obama's rivals respond that the plan will be interpreted by the radicals and those sitting on the fence as yet another victory in undermining the US.

Thus far, Obama's strategy of wooing the world's Muslims has been an utter failure. Despite the prominent dispute vis-à-vis Israel, the reconciliation speeches, and the warm embrace for America's Muslims community, recent polls in Muslim states showed that hostility towards the US and doubts towards Obama are back to pre-election rates.

In light of the above, the argument that building a mosque near Ground Zero would contribute to the war against al-Qaeda seems unfounded. While the harm to victims' families and New Yorkers is substantial and immediate, the expected strategic outcome is rather questionable. It would have been better for all parties involved to come up with another site that would grant Muslim freedom of worship while being endorsed by the families and New York residents.


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On Whose Side is Obama?
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Imam Rauf on Israel's Destruction
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The Mosque of War




Ynet News