"The headlines in the Muslim world will be that Islam is under attack… (there’s) the danger of the radicals in the Muslim world to our national security, to the national security of our troops," he said.

"If we do move," Rauf continued, "it will strengthen the argument of the radicals to recruit, their ability to recruit, and their increasing aggression and violence against our country."

"If this is not handled correctly, this crisis could become much bigger than the Danish cartoon crisis, which resulted in attacks on Danish embassies in various parts of the Muslim world," Rauf said later. "…. If we don't handle this crisis correctly it could become something which could really become very, very, very dangerous indeed."

An anti-Islamic preacher backed off and then threatened to reconsider burning the Quran on the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, angrily accusing a Muslim leader of lying to him Thursday with a promise to move an Islamic center and mosque away from New York’s ground zero.  The imam planning the center denied there was ever such a deal.

The Rev. Terry Jones generated an international firestorm with his plan to burn the Quran on Saturday, the ninth anniversary of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, and he has been under intense pressure to give it up.  Barack Obama urged him to listen to "those better angels" and give up his "stunt," saying it would endanger U.S. troops and give Islamic terrorists a recruiting tool.  Defense Secretary Robert Gates took the extraordinary step of calling Jones personally.

Standing outside his 50-member Pentecostal church, the Dove Outreach Center, alongside Imam Muhammad Musri, the president of the Islamic Society of Central Florida, Jones said he relented when Musri assured him that the New York mosque will be moved.

Musri, however, said after the news conference that the agreement was only for him and Jones to travel to New York and meet Saturday with the imam overseeing plans to build a mosque near ground zero.

Hours later, Jones said Musri "clearly, clearly lied to us."

"If we say that their religion is somehow offensive . . . what are we saying to them?  I’ve got Muslims fighting in the uniform of the armed services of the United States.  They’re putting their lives on the line for us. . . . There is no us and them. There is only us."

"He seems by his actions to be more interested in confrontation than in healing."

"The imam has a right to put the mosque there. Freedom of religion gives him that right. The minister has the right to burn the Quran. The same amendment to the constitution gives him that right."

"In either case common sense and a real dedication to healing that these men of god would theoretically have would tell you not to do it because you are hurting too many people."

"People asked me right after the 9/11 attacks as to why do movements with political agendas carry [Islamic] religious names?  Why call it 'Muslim Brotherhood' or 'Hezbollah (Party of Allah)' or 'Hamas' or 'Islamic Resistance Movement'?  I answer them this -- that the trend towards Islamic law and justice begins in religious movements, because secularism has failed to deliver what the Muslim wants, which is life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. . . .The only law that the Muslim needs exists already in the Koran and the Hadith."

Comparing the planners of the Muslim community center and mosque to be built two blocks from ground zero to Rosa Parks, leaders of numerous American Muslim organizations declared their strong support for the project on Monday, and said it should not move....

"We stand for the constitutional right of Muslims and Americans of all faiths to build houses of worship anywhere in our nation as allowed by local laws and regulations," said the statement read by Al-Amin Latif, president of the Majlis Ash-Shura of New York, also known as the Islamic Leadership Council of Metropolitan New York, which represents 55 mosques and Muslim groups.  "Also, we stand against the racism, hatred, religious intolerance and ethnic bigotry directed against Islam and American Muslims."...

"Ground zero is all of ours," said Nihad Awad, the executive director of the [Hamas-linked] Council on American-Islamic Relations.  "Ground zero does not belong to a specific group of people or religion.  Ground zero belongs to all Americans, and we all share the grief, we all share the healing."  He said it was unfair to associate the planned community center or all Muslims with 9/11.

Mahdi Bray, executive director of the Washington-based [Muslim Brotherhood front] Muslim American Society Freedom, the civil rights branch of the Muslim American Society , compared those who want the project built elsewhere to those who he said told Rosa Parks: "We want you to move.  You offend us being where you are.  This is not the right place for you to be."

[...] On its face, the use of federal funds for this project would be the height of irony. Picture it: an Islamic center hard by Ground Zero -- the very site where Islamists struck Americans on 9/11 -- built in part with post-9/11 money from . . . Americans.

Heck, if you're going to rub your victims' noses in the dirt, why not use their money to do it?

Could there be any more reason to oppose this project? [...]

Those who back the mosque, like Mayor Bloomberg, argue that supporting it is necessary to show tolerance for Islam and a commitment to constitutional freedoms of religion and speech.

But the mosque debate has never been about that.  Rather, it's been about the intent of the project -- ostensibly, to foster greater understanding of Islam and improve ties between cultures.

Fact is, everything its backers have done to ram this project through -- from siting it near Ground Zero to this latest attempt to use 9/11 funds for, among other things, Arabic courses -- gives the lie to that goal.

If these folks get even one dime of US taxpayer funding, Americans will be taken for fools -- yet again....