Murdered Daniel Pearl’s dad says 9/11 mosque should be built elsewhere

NEW YORK - The father of murdered Wall Street Journal reporter Daniel Pearl has said that public reaction suggests that a proposed mosque and Islamic centre to come up near Ground Zero, should not be considered and be moved elsewhere.

“Public reaction tells us that it is not the right time, and that it will create further animosity and division in this country,” Judea Pearl told the Jewish Telegraph Agency.

“If I were Mayor Bloomberg, I would reassert the right to build the mosque, but I would expend the same energy trying to convince them to put it somewhere else,” the New York Post quoted Pearl, as saying.

Bloomberg had defended the mosque’s imam Tuesday by noting that he gave a moving 2002 eulogy for Pearl, a Jewish victim of terrorism.

Daniel Pearl was an American journalist who was kidnapped and killed by terrorists.

At the time of his kidnapping, Pearl served as the South Asia Bureau Chief of the Wall Street Journal, and was based in Mumbai.

He went to Pakistan as part of an investigation into the alleged links between Richard Reid (the “shoe bomber”) and Al-Qaeda. His captors subsequently beheaded him.

In July 2002, Ahmed Omar Saeed Sheikh, a British national of Pakistani origin, was sentenced to death by hanging for Pearl’s abduction and murder.

In March 2007, at a closed military hearing in Guant�namo Bay, Cuba, Khalid Sheikh Mohammed said that he had personally beheaded Pearl.

A majority of Americans don’t think it is appropriate to build a mosque and Islamic cultural centre two blocks from the site of the 9/11 terrorist attacks on the World Trade Centre.

According to a new CBS News poll, nearly three of four Americans — 72 percent-say building a mosque so close to the site is not appropriate, while just 22 percent say it is appropriate.

Those who have a favourable opinion of Islam are more inclined to think the mosque is appropriate, with 50 percent calling it appropriate and 42 percent saying it isn’t.

Those who view Islam unfavourably decidedly think it’s inappropriate 88 percent going against it to nine percent.

Nevertheless, most Americans also agree that the developers do have a right to build a mosque there. Sixty-seven percent say they do while 29 percent say they do not.

Overall, 24 percent of Americans have a favourable impression of Islam while far more — 39 percent-have an unfavourable opinion of the religion. Nearly as many– 37 percent-don’t have an opinion. (ANI)