The Manhattan Mosque Incident

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The Manhattan Mosque Incident

A Reflection

Jay B Gaskill

Putting a foreign-financed mosque in the very shadow of Ground Zero is about ideology and a not-trivial security threat; it is not about religion, much less freedom of religion.

Imagine this scenario: The current administration succeeds in moving the trial of one of the 911 mastermind terrorists to the Manhattan venue proposed by US Attorney General Holder, while at the same time the 911 mosque opens for worship. The mosque has a capacity at least 1,000, with attendance from all over the world, and the trial attracts a concerted infiltration attempt by militant Islamists who attempt to overwhelm homeland security.

This is an impending train wreck of epic proportions and it has been facilitated by a supremely naïve politically correct ethos that shows striking “courage” only when dumping on left-wing-approved targets, and no spine whatsoever when real courage is called for to face real enemies is real time in the real world.

At present the homeland security apparatus (like the CIA) is being run by a political appointee with absolutely zero national security credentials. At the same time, the presidency is increasingly sounding like a late night seminar in Jimmie Carter’s school for failed leaders.

As the mosque juggernaut proceeds to steamroll local and national resistance, all American are entitled to ask:

What happened to the thorough search of foreign Islamic sources of funding for this mosque?

Who has vetted the backers, supporters and string-pullers for this effort?

Where is the transparency?

How can this administration’s sense of complacency be reconciled with the post-911 apologetics (i.e., that the attacks were brought on by American misbehavior) by one of the leading Imams affiliated with the new mosque?

Who will pay for the security?

The proposed mosque is to be erected in a commercial district. Zoning, the New York authorities will argue, is not about religion. Well, zoning is about patterns of use in the designated area, including security issues.

And free speech has traditionally been subject to reasonable time, place and manner restrictions.

Consider whether a shrine to right-wing militias could be built (with facilities for at least 1,000 attendees at a time) within a few blocks of the White House.

The Manhattan mosque danger is real and it will not go away in our lifetime. Thousands of the followers of Islam from all over the world will attend any 911 mosque.

Remember what happened in Iraq? On February 22, 2006, the recently liberated country of Iraq was plunged into a bitter internecine religious conflict bordering on full-on civil war when a beloved Shiite shrine (the Askariya shrine in Samarra) was blown up by militant Islamists. Given the location, even a moderate Islamic shrine is at risk.... We might add – especially a moderate Islamic shrine.

The most serious problem with naïve, politically correct thinking is that its adherents fail to recognize the gravity of the threat posed by existential, real-time, well funded evil. Have no doubt: Radical Islam will choose the 911mosque as a target, use it as a staging ground, make it the scene of a great martyrdom and a propaganda coup...any combination of the foregoing as it suits their agenda, by any means necessary.

A huge number of Americans (a growing super-majority) are dead set against this mosque. To paraphrase Senator Kerry, this is the wrong mosque, in the wrong place at the wrong time. Part of me wonders whether Mayor Bloomberg is a closet republican after all. By seemingly providing political cover to President Obama, the mayor has enabled POTUS to follow his naïve instincts into a hole so deep and slippery that hundreds of elected democrats are still scrambling to escape as I write this.

JBG