Regarding Park 51 and Funding
Developer Confident That Park51 Will Receive Funding
The developer behind the plan to build a mosque and Islamic culture center near the World Trade Center site said Friday that he isn’t worried about the current lack of funds for the project.
Speaking with John Gambling on WOR radio, Sharif El-Gamal said he’s confident in the national fundraising campaign he just started for the Park51 project.He also said changing the location now because of opposition would compromise his values as an American.
El-Gamal stressed the center would serve people of all faiths and provide hundreds of jobs for the community.
He said Community Board 1, which represents neighborhood of the proposed center, voted in favor of the project on two different occasions.
“This was the community speaking and saying, we want this here,” said El-Gamal on the program. “What you are reacting to and what you have been digesting and what the general public has been hearing is a manufactured media campaign that has been organized by a force of evil against my faith and my practice.”
As far as concerns about where funding would come from, El-Gamal said he refuses to accept money from any group or country hostile to the United States.
