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New York (CNN) -- Those for and against a mosque near ground zero butted heads during a passionate three-hour hearing of New York's Landmarks Preservation Commission Tuesday night.
Officially the hearing was for taking testimony on whether a more than century-old building is worth preserving, but those pushing for the landmark status are opposed to the mosque and community center at the site where the twin towers of the World Trade Center were destroyed by Islamist hijackers on September 11, 2001.
The contentious nature of the hearing was expected, because if the commission rules the building is not worth landmarking, it will pave the way for the project that is planned there. Opponents dominated the hearing.
"It would be a terrible mistake to destroy a 154-year-old building in order to build a monument to terrorism," one woman said.
"It's called Islamaphobia, pure and simple," said Zead Ramadan while being heckled.
Video: Outrage over proposed mosque
RELATED TOPICS
September 11 Attacks
Manhattan
Islam
Earlier this month, a community board said the building at the site wasn't architecturally significant enough to landmark.
The project calls for a 13-story community center including a mosque, performing art center, gym, swimming pool and other public spaces.
It is a collaboration between the American Society for Muslim Advancement and the Cordoba Initiative.
The Cordoba Initiative aims to improve relations between Muslims and the West.
"The Cordoba Initiative hopes to build a $100 million, 13-story community center with Islamic, interfaith and secular programming, similar to the 92nd Street Y," its website says, referring to the cultural institution on the upper East side of Manhattan.
But some at the hearing were suspicious of Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, who heads the Cordoba Initiative -- including Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Lazio, who called for an investigation into its funding.
"We're asking for a delay in the process to get some answers," Lazio said.
Feisal was out of the country and did not attend the hearing.
But New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg rejected the notion.
"The government should never be in the business of telling people how they should pray or where they can pray," he said.
Daisy Khan of the American Society for Muslim Advancement said ahead of the hearing that it would be a "community center with a prayer space inside."
She said the project was an opportunity for American Muslims living in New York to "give back" to the community.
"There is a lot of ignorance about who Muslims are. A center like this will be dedicated to removing that ignorance and it will also counter the extremists because moderate Muslims need a voice," she said. "Their voices need to be amplified."
"Building the Ground Zero mosque is not an issue of religious freedom, but of resisting an effort to insult the victims of 9/11 and to establish a beachhead for political Islam and Islamic supremacism in New York ... ground zero is a war memorial, a burial ground. Respect it," said Pamela Geller, a conservative blogger, on her group's website, "Stop Islamicization of America."
Geller recently told CNN's Joy Behar that no one is telling the mosque's planners they can't build it, but "We're asking them not to."
"We feel it would be more appropriate maybe to build a center dedicated to expunging the Quranic texts of the violent ideology that inspired jihad, or perhaps a center to the victims of hundreds of millions of years of jihadi wars, land enslavements, cultural annihilations and mass slaughter," Geller said.
The heckling and intense nature of the hearing got to be too much for some.
"I'm ashamed to be an American today," said Rakif Gathwari, a Muslim American, who reminded the crowd that people from many countries and religions died on September 11.
"I want to prove to this hall that I am a citizen," Gathwari said, holding up her passport.
The project already has the backing of the Community Board of lower Manhattan. If the building now at the site doesn't gain landmark status, no additional city permission is required for it to be demolished and the project to go ahead.
Officially the hearing was for taking testimony on whether a more than century-old building is worth preserving, but those pushing for the landmark status are opposed to the mosque and community center at the site where the twin towers of the World Trade Center were destroyed by Islamist hijackers on September 11, 2001.
The contentious nature of the hearing was expected, because if the commission rules the building is not worth landmarking, it will pave the way for the project that is planned there. Opponents dominated the hearing.
"It would be a terrible mistake to destroy a 154-year-old building in order to build a monument to terrorism," one woman said.
"It's called Islamaphobia, pure and simple," said Zead Ramadan while being heckled.
Video: Outrage over proposed mosque
RELATED TOPICS
September 11 Attacks
Manhattan
Islam
Earlier this month, a community board said the building at the site wasn't architecturally significant enough to landmark.
The project calls for a 13-story community center including a mosque, performing art center, gym, swimming pool and other public spaces.
It is a collaboration between the American Society for Muslim Advancement and the Cordoba Initiative.
The Cordoba Initiative aims to improve relations between Muslims and the West.
"The Cordoba Initiative hopes to build a $100 million, 13-story community center with Islamic, interfaith and secular programming, similar to the 92nd Street Y," its website says, referring to the cultural institution on the upper East side of Manhattan.
But some at the hearing were suspicious of Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, who heads the Cordoba Initiative -- including Republican gubernatorial candidate Rick Lazio, who called for an investigation into its funding.
"We're asking for a delay in the process to get some answers," Lazio said.
Feisal was out of the country and did not attend the hearing.
But New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg rejected the notion.
"The government should never be in the business of telling people how they should pray or where they can pray," he said.
Daisy Khan of the American Society for Muslim Advancement said ahead of the hearing that it would be a "community center with a prayer space inside."
She said the project was an opportunity for American Muslims living in New York to "give back" to the community.
"There is a lot of ignorance about who Muslims are. A center like this will be dedicated to removing that ignorance and it will also counter the extremists because moderate Muslims need a voice," she said. "Their voices need to be amplified."
"Building the Ground Zero mosque is not an issue of religious freedom, but of resisting an effort to insult the victims of 9/11 and to establish a beachhead for political Islam and Islamic supremacism in New York ... ground zero is a war memorial, a burial ground. Respect it," said Pamela Geller, a conservative blogger, on her group's website, "Stop Islamicization of America."
Geller recently told CNN's Joy Behar that no one is telling the mosque's planners they can't build it, but "We're asking them not to."
"We feel it would be more appropriate maybe to build a center dedicated to expunging the Quranic texts of the violent ideology that inspired jihad, or perhaps a center to the victims of hundreds of millions of years of jihadi wars, land enslavements, cultural annihilations and mass slaughter," Geller said.
The heckling and intense nature of the hearing got to be too much for some.
"I'm ashamed to be an American today," said Rakif Gathwari, a Muslim American, who reminded the crowd that people from many countries and religions died on September 11.
"I want to prove to this hall that I am a citizen," Gathwari said, holding up her passport.
The project already has the backing of the Community Board of lower Manhattan. If the building now at the site doesn't gain landmark status, no additional city permission is required for it to be demolished and the project to go ahead.
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