VOORHEES, N.J., 7 November 2003 — A request by a Muslim group to spruce up an abandoned office building for use as a mosque has sparked opposition, including inflammatory warnings it could attract people connected to terrorists.
Some people in this suburb about 25 miles south of Trenton would rather the old Lafayette Office Center stayed as is — with weeds growing through cracks in the driveway and several old tires — than let the Muslim American Community Association purchase it.
The group was expected to go before the zoning board yesterday for approval of its site plan for the property, the last major bureaucratic step in the group’s quest to get a mosque.
Zia Rahman, one of the Muslim group’s three trustees, said there is a big enough concentration of Muslims around Voorhees to justify getting their wish.
Opponents’ tactics have included an anonymous flier sent to many homes in August, just before a zoning board hearing.
The one-page tract reads, in part: “Muslim worshippers who are extremists and radicals can pray side by side with conservative believers. These extremists and radicals could include individuals with connections to terrorists.”
Rahman said he expected opposition, but not to such an extent.
“I felt they were going a little too far inflaming the public,” Rahman said.
Some, however, said it’s unfair to lump all opponents with the people who produced that flier. Kim Accardo, whose home sits within a few hundred feet of the building, said most are just concerned about traffic in an already congested area.
“They have a right to worship,” said Accardo. “We feel very strongly that they have the wrong location. They’re building it on a site where there’s absolutely no room for growth.”
Evening prayers that end during rush hour could make it nearly impossible for her to leave home to take her daughter to dance class, she said. The office building sits around the corner from an expanding housing development and across the street from a bustling private school.
Ibrahim Hooper, a spokesman for the Washington-based Council on American-Islamic Relations said mosques opening in the suburbs across the country have run into similar criticism — a mix of land-use concerns and anti-Muslim attitudes.
Opponents of one Islamic school in the Washington area, he said, fretted over the possibility of students using missiles to shoot down low-flying planes.
As a result, some Islamic groups have taken to using non-Muslim buyers to purchase land for them.
“It’s symptomatic of the general prejudice out there,” Hooper said. “It’s something that’s encountered by many Muslim communities where they’re growing.”
In Voorhees, a group with members representing the Anti-Defamation League, a Unitarian Universalist congregation and a Roman Catholic church formed an association to endorse the mosque.
“We felt there were feelings of prejudice creeping in and we were going to act,” said Lori Volpe, an organizer of the Coalition for a Multi-Faith Democracy.
