The Mosque

I have been asked to comment on the mosque that is planned for the WTC site. I have to come clean and say that I am by no means objective about this. For as long as I can remember, Muslims have done their best to spread terror and tyranny across the globe. I remember, as a kid, watching the news reports as the Black September group murdered Israeli athletes at the 1972 Olympics in Munich. A large part of the reason I joined the Army in 1980 was because it looked like we were going to have to go get our people out of Iran after the Muslim extremists took over our embassy in 1979. I was still in when they bombed the Marine barracks in Beirut in 1983. I remember when Navy diver Robert Dean Stethem was tortured and executed by Muslim hijackers in 1985, and a whole litany of other attacks upon Americans by Muslims.

They have repeatedly demonstrated that there is no placating them, no reasoning with them, and no trusting them. Were it left up to me, every Mosque between Dearborn and Mecca would be leveled. In Iraq and Afghanistan, I would have unleashed total war upon those that would attack us until every Imam the world over woke up at night screaming in terror at the prospect of American operatives coming to exact retribution.

I have no love for them. None.

That said, my reasons for not wanting a mosque on the 9/11 site are less strident; I do not want a symbol of Muslim victory to commemorate the attack on our soil. Understand, to Muslims, building a mosque on that site is the equivalent to the Marines raising the flag at Mt. Suribachi. To Muslims the world over, it would be a constant reminder of the victory that they secured from us. It would embolden our enemies and make that spot a place of pilgimage nearly as important as the city that spawned the child molestor that brought the scourge of Islam into the world.

The best thing we could have done was to rebuild the WTC immediately, exactly as it was. This would have shown that we could not be brought down by a bunch of glorified goatherders and that we certainly wouldn't kowtow to terror. Either that, or I like this idea:

Like I said, I'm not the best guy to ask.