Suddenly the proposed construction of a mosque near the World Trade Center Ground Zero site has grown from a New York area news story to a matter of national and even international significance. 

While the debate over the proposed mosque and Islamic center has been simmering in the last few weeks, it boiled over last Friday when President Obama, who had been ducking the issue for weeks (his press secretary said it was a local issue), seemingly declared his support for the mosque at a dinner commemorating the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.  The President recognized the sensibilities about Ground Zero (he called it “hallowed ground”), but declared to the Ramadan gathering that “Muslims have the same right to practice their religion as anyone else in the country.”

However, the speech produced major criticism from both 9/11 families and Republicans like Long Island Congressman Peter King and the White House had to beat a retreat, stating that the President was merely expressing his belief in religious freedom and not the mosque itself.  This seemed a bit implausible in light of the audience for his remarks ( The New York Times headline reporting on the speech was “Obama Backs Islam Center Near 9/11 Site”), but was probably the best political spin available.  However, it did not prevent Republican candidates around the country from attempting to pin down their opponents on this issue.  Senate Democratic majority leader Harry Reid, locked in a life and death reelection battle, decided that it was a good idea to express opposition to the mosque.  Supporters of the mosque were also not helped when the radical Hamas group announced its support for construction.

But politics aside, what are the merits of the mosque and Islamic center, whose sponsors assert will be a source of education about the Muslim religion as well as a voice for moderates of that faith?

Supporters of the mosque are correct on one crucial point.  As a legal matter, Muslims have a constitutionally protected right to build their house of worship where they please, subject to the same rules applicable to an organization putting up a church or synagogue on the same site.  Accordingly, zoning or other regulatory challenges that would not be upheld against a Christian or Jewish house of worship cannot appropriately be allowed against the proposed Islamic center. 

That being said, building a mosque in that location is incredibly insensitive. Yes, the vast majority of Muslims in the world, and particularly in the United States, are peaceful folks and certainly not jihadists. But the attacks on 9/11 that took the lives of thousands of Americans were the work of Islamic extremists.  A mosque celebrating Islam just a few yards where people died at the hands  of extremist coreligionists is just as inappropriate as erecting a Japanese cultural center a few feet from Pearl Harbor. 

Perhaps the organizers of the mosque do not realize the deep trauma that was inflicted on the New York community on that September morning nine years ago. I was working a few hundred yards away from the site and I vividly remember the dust and smoke and fire.  Many families, of course, have much worse memories of that day.  

Whatever the legalities, insisting on a mosque near the site of this horrific attack will inflame rather than help relations between the Muslim community and its neighbors.  The mosque proponents should take up Governor Paterson’s offer to find another, more appropriate venue.