45 Park Place, New York: The Islamic center controversy

Hassan Al-Haifi
Published:06-09-2010
Yemen Times

If anything can be learned about the sensationalism and controversy that has arisen over a proposed Islamic Cultural Center to be built a couple of blocks away from “Ground Zero”, the location that embraced the former magnificent architectural wonder that was the World Trade Center, it is that the terrorists have indeed got what they were after. In fact, one is inclined to believe that the terrorists were out to portray Islam in a way that fumigates the air with inter religious enmity and violence and creates hostility between believers in the same Divinity as called for by the three leading monotheistic religions of the world, Christianity, Islam and Judaism.

The horrific destruction of the WTC is as distant from genuine Islamic doctrine and proper conduct and practice by Moslems, as Hiroshima and Nagasaki are to Christian teachings and behavior of devout followers of Jesus Christ (peace and blessings of Allah be upon him). To attempt to permanently affix the terrible crime of the unimaginable destruction of WTC as part and parcel of Islamic teachings and conduct of Moslem believers is really submission to the designs and objectives of whoever was behind this most horrific of crimes against humanity and human civilization. All the evidence and post Isalmiphobia that has arisen since that tragic day of September 11, 2001 point to the reality of the 9/11 incident as a clear project to unleash ethnic hatred and religious strife amongst human beings under cover of a well designed cloak of intentional religious misrepresentation. Needless to say, the phenomenal case of unholy mass murder is as much harmful to Islam and Moslems as any scheme to distort the teachings of Islam could be. Surely, informed and progressive minded people will not hesitate to point out that the Koran and the Prophet Mohammad are as innocent of 9/11 as the Bible and Jesus Christ are innocent of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the Inquisition and the Serbian persecution of the Bosnians, not to mention the Holocaust, all of which involved the large-scale senseless and cold blooded murder of millions of innocent unarmed people for their religious persuasions, ethnic affiliation or both by those who supposedly engraved the cross in their hearts and often in their flags, even in its Swastika format. For sure, the Koran and the Prophet Mohammad are as innocent and free of blame for 9/11 as the Torah and Jewish Scriptures and Moses (PABUH) are of the horrible massacres and ethnic cleansing that the Holy Land has witnessed for the past nine decades by bearers of the Star of David. For a more thorough insight and comprehensive understanding of Islamic religious beliefs and practices readers are guided to click this link (http://www.knowtheprophet.com/his-life/etenral_,message.htm).

On a daily basis, the whole world is witnessing the horrible acts of terrorism inflicted on scores of Moslems by reportedly similar disoriented ideologues to those who are alleged to have carried out the 9/11 attack. In fact, the number of Moslems who have become victims of alleged Moslem terrorists has at least almost doubled the number of victims of the infamous 9/11 attacks on the WTC (aside from the hundreds of thousands of mostly civilian casualties of the wars that presumably were carried out to pursue the alleged culprits of 9/11, who are still at large!). Yet, hate mongers and political opportunists never fail to rush to associate Islam and all Moslems with 9/11, forgetting that Islamic religious tolerance is second to none as history has categorically shown.

When the Second Caliph of Islam Omer visited Jerusalem after its liberation from the chauvinistic Byzantines (with the support of local Christian Arabs), he went to salute the Patriarch of the Church of the Ascension. When the Patriarch invited the Caliph to pray in the Church (which incidentally is not forbidden in Islam), he thanked the Patriarch for his hospitality and went out to pray outside beside the Church. When asked why he did not pray inside, since churches and synagogues are viewed as Houses of God, he said: “Lest this becomes a precedence for future excessively fanatical Moslem leaders that they can enter churches and institute any violations of the sanctity of these churches as they erroneously might consider, while these churches still had large Christian constituents”, or something to that order.

When Moslem states over the centuries failed in protecting Christian minorities in their midst, they abashedly refunded all the “protection levies” imposed on non-Moslems since the Zakat Islamic levy was not obligatory on non-Moslems. This is the Islam that reflects the teachings of the Prophet Mohammad and the Holy Quran and may be construed as having been violated by any Moslem, who is allegedly involved with 9/11, who will unmistakably be condemned to hell.

Those who insist that 9/11 is derived from Islamic teachings are as guilty of ignorance, if not outright bigotry based on blind prejudice, as those who stubbornly claim that the economic woes of the West are due to the manipulations of the financial and economic institutions of Jewish bankers and investment brokers. All genuine believers in Allah and followers of the teachings of the Prophet Mohammad are obligated to condone and condemn attacks like 9/11 and the ongoing terrorism by misguided fanatics and deviants of Islamic religious doctrine in Iraq, Pakistan and elsewhere in the Moslem World. The hatred witnessed by the antagonists of 45 Park Place in New York are not doing Christianity or Judaism any good by spilling the fuel of hatred for a seemingly routine, transparent and legitimate religious cultural center.

Ironically, Islamic doctrine insists that Judaism and Christianity are themselves part and parcel of Islamic spiritual inclinations and represent important stages of development for the eventual culmination to Islam; i.e. they emanate from the same Divinity to which adherents of Judaism, Christianity and Islam have faith in and equally revere all the prophets of the Old and New Testament as deliverers of mankind from the arrogance, bigotry, chauvinism and hatred that have blemished the socio-political development of mankind in order to serve the narrow interests and demonic ambitions of those who insist on thriving from the propagation of misrepresented profiles of genuine religious inclinations and on the right to reject and persecute those who persist in declaring that the Lord All-Mighty is one and the same for all monotheistic persuasions.

Incidentally there were reportedly some 60 Moslems who died at the WTC on that tragic day of 9/11 or .001 percent of the estimated Moslem population of the US if estimated to be around 5,000,000. The total number of fatalities of that day comes to 3,000 unfortunate souls, which also comes to 0.001 percent of the entire population of the United States

Yemen Times Issuee 1396
Published:06-09-2010