In August 2010, a highly emotional and impassioned debate erupted over plans to build an Islamic cultural center in Lower Manhattan. Cordoba House, as it was known, was a proposed Islamic community center intended to promote interfaith dialogue. 

     Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, the founder of the project, described his intentions this way: “My ambition was to create a Muslim version of the 92nd Street Y in New York that would have cultural and educational programs, a prayer space, and a community center to promote a distinctively American Muslim identity, as well as a welcoming space for people of other faiths to build bridges and engage with each other.”

​    His vision was for the center to be “a beacon of transformative spirituality for the American Muslim community in New York and beyond. Grounded in the authentic essence of faith through worship of the One God, the purpose of the Cordoba House is to establish a compassionate forward thinking, moderate, pluralistic and inclusive Muslim community that applies a holistic approach to education, social services and activities, interfaith relations and cultural events.”  

     Sounds kind of cool, right?  Possibly, but Cordoba House had one major lightning-rod issue: the location.  Because the center was going to be built two blocks from the World Trade Center it became super controversial, with many opponents of the project referring to it as the “Ground Zero Mosque.”  

     Without question, for many of the Americans old enough to remember that horrific day, the sorrow of 9/11 is still as heartbreaking as it was the day it happened. It’s perfectly understandable that many Americans had strong feelings about an Islamic cultural center being built close to Ground Zero, especially at a time when our soldiers still fought overseas and acts of terror continued in the name of Islam.

     That said, this could have been an excellent opportunity for our president, members of Congress, and local leaders to demonstrate domestic and international leadership. After all, the Pew Research Center estimated there were 3.45 million Muslims of all ages living in America at the time. Promoting trust between Muslims and non-Muslims was super important as we fought homegrown violent extremists and terrorists abroad, and Muslims were helping greatly with that effort every day. 

     Many Afghan- and Iraqi Americans, for example, were assisting our military by providing cultural knowledge of the region and by graciously helping with language translation skills. Plus, there were almost 6,000 self-identified Muslims serving in the military (this number was probably higher since 400,000 service members elected to not report their faith).

      It would have been extraordinary to have had brave leaders who possessed the fortitude and courage to do what was right, even if it happened to be unpopular at the time. The Cordoba House controversy was the perfect opportunity for our leaders to challenge Americans to 1) acknowledge the pain of the past but, at the same time, move forward with greater understanding and tolerance; 2) remember that the War on Terror was not a war against Islam; and 3) attempt to reconcile the American way of life with the peaceful believers of the world’s second-largest religion.

     But, unfortunately, with very few exceptions – then New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg being one – most of our leaders chose to be puppets of politics and polls instead of exhibiting true leadership.

    This is a true shame. In the face of terror, it’s imperative we not lose the very essence of who we are. We are the country that celebrates life, liberty, and justice for all. We are the country that perfected the right to peaceful assembly, freedom of speech, and the free exercise of religion. Beyond anything, the core question in this situation is:  Do we really want to live in a country that prohibits private citizens from building places to worship and celebrating their religion? 

     Regardless of your answer to that question, it’s not really our choice to make, because the question was answered definitively on December 15, 1791. The First Amendment does not say: Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press, or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances – unless those rights make us uncomfortable.

    Here’s where Counter-Ideological Warfare comes in. Critics of the mosque suggested that Osama bin Laden and the hijackers’ greatest triumph would be to see a mosque built as a monument to their “victory.” However, in truth, Osama bin Laden’s reaction would have likely been the exact opposite. Imams like Feisal Abdul Rauf were bin Laden’s worst enemies because he deeply resented, and was openly hostile, to Muslims with moderate Islamist orientations. And besides, the construction of a building pales in comparison to the terrorists’ victory if we allow them to deconstruct the entire moral code of this country.

      Enlightenment on issues like these is not needed just to enhance diplomacy or soothe hurt feelings. At times, it’s a matter of life and death. If President George W. Bush had been more knowledgeable of the enormous disparities between the Salafist jihadists of al-Qaeda and the secular Baathists of Iraq, for example, his war plans may have looked far different in the first place. Well over three decades have passed since the First Gulf War and still most of our leaders have a dangerously inadequate knowledge of the many divisions, complexities and nuances within the Islamic world. The tendency is to view the Muslim world as a single terrifying entity, which is just wrong.

      Many of the words, concepts and traditions prevalent in the Middle East were then – and to this day remain – unfamiliar to most our leaders. …but don’t you think it’s important for them to have at least basic knowledge and understanding of the terrorists we are fighting against?​ To be clear, we’re not saying our leaders necessarily failed us by not demanding the Cordoba House be built near Ground Zero. We’re simply saying that, at the time, a new narrative was of the greatest consequence in both domestic issues and in our broader struggle against Islamic extremists and that we needed leaders with the guts to tell us so – despite its lack of popularity. 

     According to a Time magazine poll taken at the time, 61 percent of Americans opposed the construction of the Cordoba House project, and over 70 percent felt that continuing with the plan would be an insult to the victims of the attacks on the World Trade Center. 

Predictably, many politicians read this and decided the smartest thing for them to do politically was to make things far worse by inciting their audience through fear and hate-filled rhetoric. So, naturally, the conversation metastasized into an opportunity for them and their buddies to exhibit despicable behavior.

      Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich seemed to speak for many on the right when he proclaimed: “Nazis don’t have the right to put up a sign next to the Holocaust museum in Washington” and “we would never accept the Japanese putting up a site next to Pearl Harbor” and “there should be no mosque near Ground Zero in New York so long as there are no churches or synagogues in Saudi Arabia.” That’s just great…now we’ve lowered the bar for America to Saudi Arabian standards? 

     Martin Peretz, then editor-in-chief of The New Republic, wrote, “I wonder whether I need honor these people and pretend they are worthy of the privileges of the First Amendment, which I have in my gut the sense that they will abuse.” … and so now some guy named  Martin Peretz is the decider on which Americans are worthy of the protections of the First Amendment?

     Sadly, there was only one big winner in this controversy:  al-Qaeda, who mocked us while we essentially did their recruiting for them. Once again, we gave terrorists a golden opportunity to negatively frame America’s image for their potential followers. As former FBI terrorist interrogator Ali Soufan put it, Osama bin Laden’s “next video script has just written itself.” Zabihullah, a Taliban operative, told Newsweek, “By preventing this mosque from being built, America is doing us a big favor. It’s providing us with more recruits, donations, and popular support. The more mosques you stop, the more jihadis we will get.” Zabihullah went on to explain that this was such a huge boost for their cause, in fact, that it had made its way to the very top of the agenda in Taliban meetings with existing members and potential recruits.

     “We talk about how America tortures with waterboarding, about the cruel confinement of Muslims in wire cages in Guantánamo, about the killing of innocent women and children in air attacks – and now America gives us another gift with its street protests to prevent a mosque from being built in New York,” he said. “Showing reality always makes the best propaganda.”

      The most heartbreaking consequence of the Cordoba House debate was the damage the rhetoric undoubtedly did to our troops who were fighting so honorably for freedom. One can only imagine their dismay and bewilderment as they watched this madness play out stateside, while they endured sandstorms and gunfire to be our faithful ambassadors of democracy and freedom.