(This will be a repost every 9/11) Bob Beckwith is the FDNY firefighter who stood next to George W. Bush during his famous bullhorn speech at Ground Zero, just days after September 11th, 2001. His story is incredible, and he shares it with Glenn in a perfect tribute to remember the first responders and other lives effected by 9/11/2001.
Ground Zero
Church Rejected,Mosque Defended=Tolerant Liberal
I find it telling that when I debate/discuss the issue of the Mosque at Ground-Zero, almost no one from the progressive left knows about the city of New York not allowing a Christian Orthodox Church that was damaged in 9/11 to be rebuilt. Creeping Sharia posts this video of the matter for those who do not know:
Gigantic, sharia-compliant, taxpayer funded mosques run by taxpayer funded and government supported Islamists at Ground Zero. But a church destroyed by Muslims not getting approval to rebuild. Why? Full story at Church left out of 9/11 renewal (See also: Why won’t NYC allow church destroyed on 9/11 to be rebuilt?)
In my many debates on the topic, the almost feverish support for the building of a mosque that didn’t exist prior to 9/11 was defended in exclusion to the preexisting rebuilding of a church. In other words: Christianity bad, and now the apparently tax-payer funded Islamic mosque, good.
A request made all the more outrageous by the fact that Rauf & Co. have shown themselves to be some of the most startlingly incompetent managers of money and property in recent memory:
In late August, we found out that the mosque developers were tax deadbeats to the tune of $224,000. In an application for tax-exempt status, Rauf claimed to operate a mosque that could hold 500 people, but in reality was an apartment that could not hold so many worshipers if they were crammed in like clowns in a Volkswagen. Rauf has filed a false tax return. He is a slumlord — the worst in Union City, New Jersey.
Meanwhile, the thug Sharif el-Gamal has been sued for an unpaid loan, and faced eviction from his SoHo office over $39,000 in back rent. He was found to owe $21,000 in fines on a property with 13 violations. And there are other unanswered questions.
And now they want more money — your money. The sense of entitlement that pervades the entire Ground Zero mosque project never ceases to amaze, as unsurprising as it is given the triumphalist agenda that drives it.
More Ground Zero Mosque News-Debate (Bob Beckel vs. Pamela Geller!)
A New Video of Army Specialist Zachari Klawonn Giving An Arab TV Show An Interview About the Army and Islamophobia
This first video is from an older post via Gateway Pundit:
Spec. Zachari Klawonn is upset that someone banged on his door at 2 in the morning. It was a horrible experience. He was upsetting the soldiers so he moved off base…
Now he is suing the US Army.
Listen to the whole thing and ask yourself if this was a setup.
CNN pushes this anti-military Islamic sob story, via BreitbartTV:
Now that you are caught up, in case you weren’t, Army Specialist gives an interview about supposed Islamophobia for an Arab show in the Middle-East. Disgraceful:
He seems to bring up the Ground Zero mosque and sets up straw men about it. Here are some great arguments against this bad thinking:
- Discussing Mosques and Men
- Michael Medved Interviews Time Magazine Deputy Managing Editor Romesh Ratnesar About the Recent Time Magazine Cover Story~Is America Islamophobic (UPDATE: At Odds with Fellow Editor Bobby Ghosh)
- Even More Muslims Have Come Out Against Placing This Mosque at Ground Zero
- Fact and Common Sense vs Bad History and Analogies
- What Is Up With The LEFT? They Attack Because This Is How They Win Arguments…
- Subject/Object Distinction-Most of America Can Do It-Why Not the Media?
ABC-NBC-CBS Percentages Regarding Mosque at Ground-Zero
NewsBusters writes about the medias shift against their viewers:
By a wide margin — 66 percent to 29 percent, according to the most recent ABC News/ Washington Post poll — the public is opposed to building that proposed $100 million Islamic cultural center near the site of the destroyed World Trade Towers. This is not a lightly-held opinion: more than half (53%) told ABC news they are “strongly opposed” to building it near Ground Zero, vs. only 14 percent who report being “strongly” in favor.
[….]
Compare this sentiment to the medias:
A Coptic Christian Pleas With New Yorkers-Points Out They Kill Christians and Jews in Muslim Countries
An angle — a truth actually — I hadn’t thought of. Before building a Mosque in order to introduce Islam to the American people in a new fresh way (propaganda)… why not stop killings Christians in Muslim nations first. Thus introducing a new and fresh way (action) of introducing Islam not just to Americans, but the world at large. Of course they should go beyond just my faith, Christianity, and stop killing Hindus, Sikhs, Arabs/Muslims, Jews, atheists, homosexuals, and the like. Then after they attack their own phobias, then we can deal with Americas “Islamophobia.”
Warning: Graphic image at the 1:50 mark (or so).
From Libertarian Republican:
Stop the Killing of Coptic Christians in Muslim Coutries
Joseph Nasralla, a Coptic Christian from Egpyt:
“I know the truth because I am from Egypt. They came and conquered our country. It’s the same way they intend to conquer America. I need to say something. Believe me… if they build this Mosque here, in 10 years, it will be too late. They will have Islamisized this country. It will be too late!”
Here is a great site, however, you need to have Google translate it:
Donald Trump on the Ground Zero Mosque
More non-sequiturs from the Left, in this case, David Letterman. He tries to make a connection between the Pilgrims and this mosque by saying that what the Pilgrims were after we should allow these particular backers of the mosque to get. He is implying that they are not being allowed to worship freely and are being persecuted. Both of which are not true. Not to mention Pilgrims were not blowing up buildings or leveling towns, or financially supporting terrorists:
Hitler Finds Out the Ground Zero Mosque Fails
Ground Zero Mosque Downfall – watch more funny videos
Subject/Object Distinction-Most of America Can Do It-Why Not the Media?
NewsBusters has a great post about percentages, and it shows that 67% of New Yorkers would prefer the Mega-Mosque (Ground Zero Mosque) built a bit further away. Maybe to a place where body parts and plane [art were not found on and in from the first plane hitting the first Tower? Just maybe? Noel Sheppard rightly pooints out this “subject” “object” distinction that New Yorkers and 72% of the nation can get, but the general media cannot: “Most people outside the liberal press are intelligent enough to understand that developers have the right to build this mosque if its zoning is approved. They just question the wisdom of doing so. If an overwhelming majority of New Yorkers can understand the difference between having the right to do something and whether or not it would be appropriate, why can’t media members?” Indeed, why can’t they. Maybe because a majority of them are very progressive in their views, no thanks to institutions like Columbia University. Here is the poll:
Over all, 50 percent of those surveyed oppose building the project two blocks north of the World Trade Center site, even though a majority believe that the developers have the right to do so. Thirty-five percent favor it.
[…]
The poll, however, reveals a more complicated portrait of the opposition in New York: 67 percent said that while Muslims had a right to construct the center near ground zero, they should find a different site.
Most strikingly, 38 percent of those who expressed support for the plan to build it in Lower Manhattan said later in a follow-up question that they would prefer it be moved farther away, suggesting that even those who defend the plan question the wisdom of the location.
…(read more)…
I wonder if this poll would even be higher if some of the terror financing connections were more widely known and quotes by this “bridge building” Imam?
Some Terror Ties Surfacing
Like I said, many Dems (not progressive liberals), will be sorry for supporting this mosque. The bricks in the wall begin to fail. Here is one of the first big investors shown to have terror ties. This comes with a FreeRepublic h/t:
MYFOXNY.COM – Fox 5 News reported Thursday that one of the financial backers of the Islamic mosque and cultural center project in Lower Manhattan once contributed to a terror group, although the investor says the contribution was made because he thought he was giving money to a harmless charity.
One of the key players in Sharif El-Gamal’s Mosque near Ground Zero is Egyptian born businessman, Hisham Elzanaty. Fox 5 News has learned exclusively and confirmed with Mr. Elzanaty’s attorney that Elzanaty made a “significant investment” in the development of the mosque near Ground Zero.
[….]
Fox 5 News has also independently confirmed information obtained by the New York Post, that in 1999 Hisham Elzanaty sent money to an organization that would later be deemed by the US government to be a terrorist group.
The organization was the Holy Land Foundation for Relief and Development, also known as HLF. The now defunct group’s 1999 tax records show Elzanaty contributed more than $6,000 to HLF.
Two years later, in 2001, HLF was shut down by the federal government and designated as a global terrorist. After a mistrial in 2007, in 2008 five HLF leaders were convicted of providing material support to Hamas.
…(read more)…
Video with a Big Peace h/t:
The Pearls Disagree With Placing Mosque At That Site
This is important and is a h/t to Marooned In Marin. Important because we hear all the time that this Imam eulagized Danial Pearl. Well, that fact has nothing to do with this debate, as Daniel’s father points out:
Judea Pearl, father of Daniel Pearl, the Wall Street Journal reporter who was kidnapped and beheaded (on video) by Khalid Shiekh Mohammed in 2002, has penned a piece against the Ground Zero Victory Mosque in the Jerusalem Post.
Excerpts:
I have been trying hard to find an explanation for the intense controversy surrounding the Cordoba Initiative, whereby 71 percent of Americans object to the proposed project of building a mosque next to Ground Zero.
I cannot agree with the theory that such broad resistance represents Islamophobic sentiments, nor that it is a product of a “rightwing” smear campaign against one imam or another.
Americans are neither bigots nor gullible.
…A more realistic explanation is that most Americans do not buy the 19 fanatics story, but view the the 9/11 assault as a product of an anti- American ideology that, for good and bad reasons, has found a fertile breeding ground in the hearts and minds of many Muslim youngsters who see their Muslim identity inextricably tied with this anti-American ideology.
THE GROUND Zero mosque is being equated with that ideology. Public objection to the mosque thus represents a vote of no confidence in mainstream American Muslim leadership which, on the one hand, refuses to acknowledge the alarming dimension that anti-Americanism has taken in their community and, paradoxically, blames America for its creation.
The American Muslim leadership has had nine years to build up trust by taking proactive steps against the spread of anti-American terror-breeding ideologies, here and abroad….
…(read more)…
COEXIST?
The idea that many faiths can co-exist with Islam is laughable. The question remains: “Would you want a person to be more like Muhammad (following his example), or Jesus (following His example)?” It a simple concept. Muhammad married a six-year old and had sex with her when she was nine. He ordered the slitting of the throats of 700-to-900 people (men, women, and children) and in fact personally helped in this endeavor. He even ordered his followers to lie (Taqiyya). Jesus, when peter struck off the ear of the Roman soldier, healed it – saying: “those who live by the sword will die by it.” He invited children into the inner circle of Jewish Pharisees and used them as examples of faith, often you will see in paintings Jesus smiling with children around. You do not see this with the militaristic person of Muhammad. Also, Jesus loved truth, even proclaiming it will set you free.
This espouses a great quote from a world religion scholar that I love:
The nine founders among the eleven living religions in the world had characters which attracted many devoted followers during their own lifetime, and still larger numbers during the centuries of subsequent history. They were humble in certain respects, yet they were also confident of a great re¬ligious mission. Two of the nine, Mahavira and Buddha, were men so strongminded and self-reliant that, according to the records, they displayed no need of any divine help, though they both taught the inexorable cosmic law of Karma. They are not reported as having possessed any consciousness of a supreme personal deity. Yet they have been strangely deified by their followers. Indeed, they themselves have been wor¬shipped, even with multitudinous idols.
All of the nine founders of religion, with the exception of Jesus Christ, are reported in their respective sacred scriptures as having passed through a preliminary period of uncertainty, or of searching for religious light. Confucius, late in life, confessed his own sense of shortcomings and his desire for further improvement in knowledge and character. All the founders of the non-Christian religions evinced inconsistencies in their personal character; some of them altered their prac¬tical policies under change of circumstances.
Jesus Christ alone is reported as having had a consistent God consciousness, a consistent character himself, and a con¬sistent program for his religion. The most remarkable and valuable aspect of the personality of Jesus Christ is the com¬prehensiveness and universal availability of his character, as well as its own loftiness, consistency, and sinlessness.
Robert Hume, The World’s Living Religions (New York, NY: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1959), 285-286.
All this understanding is summed up in this graphic that “spoofs” [tells the truth] about a good deal of Islam: