In recent weeks its been nothing short of a media frenzy around the construction of an Islamic Center at Park 51 a couple of blocks from the World Trade Center site.


The planned location for the mosque has made people cringe, calling the site “insensitive” and “too close” to Ground Zero.


I made a quick visit to the controversial Islamic center site down on Park 51 to see the commotion for myself. There were protestors – on both sides – that had staked out the site for hours.


Several cops surrounded the premises urging passers-by not block the sidewalks.


While I’m not a native New Yorker, I’ve been living in the city for the past four years and consider it home. The financial district has been my neighborhood this past summer and I walk past Ground Zero everyday. Listening to the uproar around the mosque construction made me think twice about whether the mosque should be built so close to where the two gleaming towers once stood – but I quickly realized how much the media has spun the story out of proportion and scope, and how misplaced the opposition really is.


I do agree that the mosque is provocative and people may feel upset
and uncomfortable but at the same time, it’swrong to clump an innocent group of people with the radical extremists that rammed planes into the WTC.


As one protestor put it, “It’s wrong to project your emotions on to innocent people. At some point we need to start moving forward.”


A friend and I were talking to one of mosque supporters who said he had been standing there for the past nine days, taking 8-hour shifts.
We were in the middle of our conversation when someone walked by and screamed “We will be bombed again, and I hope you and your families are the first to go.”


“Who’s talking violence now?” replied a pro-mosque supporter.


“People fear what they don’t understand,” said another.


A country that is founded on the ideals of freedom of religion needs to uphold that and stop the fear-mongering and ignorance that is dividing the country. To equate terrorism with Islam is wrong. And to build a mosque blocks from the WTC will help our country mature and move towards a greater understanding of each other.
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