Obama Tells All Video: Muslims did not cause 9/11

Sunday, 15 August 2010 03:53

Written by Bailout Main Street Now

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President Obama backs N.Y. mosque site
Erica Werner / Associated Press

Washington -- President Barack Obama on Friday took a strong stand in favor of building a mosque near the site where Muslim terrorists flew airplanes into the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, breaking his silence on a political tempest.

"As a citizen, and as president, I believe that Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as anyone else in this country," Obama said, weighing in on the controversy.

"That includes the right to build a place of worship and a community center on private property in lower Manhattan, in accordance with local laws and ordinances," he said. "This is America, and our commitment to religious freedom must be unshakable."

Obama made the comments at an annual dinner in the White House State Dining Room celebrating the Islamic holy month of Ramadan.

Republicans were quick to pounce on Obama's remarks.

"President Obama is wrong," said Rep. Peter King, R-N.Y. "It is insensitive and uncaring for the Muslim community to build a mosque in the shadow of ground zero. While the Muslim community has the right to build the mosque they are abusing that right by needlessly offending so many people who have suffered so much."

The mosque would be part of a $100 million Islamic center to be built two blocks from where nearly 3,000 people perished when hijacked jetliners slammed into the World Trade Center towers on Sept. 11, 2001.



Sarah Palin, the Republican vice-presidential candidate in 2008, called the project "an unnecessary provocation" and urged "peace-seeking Muslims" to reject it. The Anti-Defamation League, a Jewish organization, also announced it opposed the center.

A majority of Americans do not want to see the mosque built on the site, surveys show. A CNN/Opinion Research poll earlier in the month showed 68 percent opposed plans to build the mosque versus 29 percent in favor. Count as part of the minority New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who recently gave a speech defending the planned Islamic center.

In a statement released Friday night, Bloomberg said: "As I said last week, this proposed mosque and community center in lower Manhattan is as important a test of the separation of church and state as we may see in our lifetime, and I applaud President Obama's clarion defense of the freedom of religion tonight."

Opponents, including some Sept. 11 victims' relatives, see the prospect of a mosque so near the destroyed trade center as an insult to the memory of those killed in the attacks. Some of the victims' relatives, however, are in favor.

Chicago Tribune and N.Y. Times contributed.