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The news was buried under two dense paragraphs and five large photos in an article in New York YIMBY about a different project: "Construction has also yet to begin on 51 Park Place, which is slated to become a 71-foot-tall, 16,000-square-foot Islamic cultural center." The infamous Ground Zero Mosque project, a long buried effort to build a triumphal mosque at the site of the worst jihad terror attack in American history, is back. Construction has yet to begin, but it will: the shady developer behind the Ground Zero Mosque scheme, Sharif El-Gamal, has been working to build this sinister structure...

The developer of the ill-fated Ground Zero Mosque won't relent on his goal of planting a flag on the grave of 3,000 Americans. The New York Post reports that Sharif El-Gamal and his banking partners announced Wednesday that he secured "Sharia-compliant financing" to build a luxury condominium tower and an Islamic museum on the same site as the proposed Ground Zero Mosque -- four blocks away from where the Twin Towers once stood. The $174 million dollar project features a three-story Islamic cultural museum at 51 Park Place and 48 high-end residential condos in a 43-story tower at 45 Park...

NEW YORK -- The developer who once proposed a mosque and Muslim community center near ground zero now plans a museum devoted to Islam at the same site. According to The New York Times, Sharif El-Gamal said through a spokesman he wants to build a three-story museum "dedicated to exploring the faith of Islam and its arts and culture."

The controversial plan for a mosque and Islamic cultural center at Ground Zero may be scrapped and the property instead turned into residences. Sharif El-Gamal, the developer behind the stalled project, is in talks about turning the property at 43 Park Place in lower Manhattan into condominiums, reports the New York Post. …

The organization planning to build an Islamic community center near the World Trade Center said the imam who has been the public face of the project, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, will be playing a reduced role in the facility. The nonprofit group Park51 announced Friday that it had named a new imam to help lead religious programing so that Rauf could focus on other initiatives. Rauf announced late this fall that he would be starting a global movement that would fight extremism and promote better relations between people of different faiths and cultures. He is set to start a national...

Citibank sues Ground Zero mosque developer Sharif El-Gamal for $100G The developer of the so-called Ground Zero mosque owes nearly $100,000 in overdue credit, a new suit charges. In a complaint filed in Manhattan court, Citibank charges Sharif El-Gamal and his real estate firm, Soho Properties, have balked at repaying $99,489 borrowed from a business credit account in the past year. El-Gamal said the default was a standard way to negotiate better credit rates and that the matter would be resolved. "In every industry at this time, major business leaders are working with their financial institutions to restructure their debt...

Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf has advertised the controversial Ground Zero mosque as an Islamic outreach to the community, a cultural center open and intended to unify all religions. Today, he still stands by that assertion, even as his proposed mosque continues to exact the opposite effect before it’s even built. Now, harsh critics, such as Chairman of the Religious Freedom Coalition, William Murray, are presented with even more perplexing information in the form of Sharif El-Gamal (pictured), the mysterious developer behind the mosque. Reportedly a waiter by profession who suddenly “came into” the kind of money to spearhead a $100...

While there has been much emotion and argument over the proposed mosque two blocks from Ground Zero, it has largely swirled over issues that miss the nature and significance of the issues involved. Thus we hear endless variations on the theme “How can a moderate imam whose stated goal is to promote healing in the wake of 9/11 be so insensitive to the feelings of those who lost those they loved at the hands of Islamic fanatics?” But, as the public is slowly learning, Imam Rauf is no moderate and bridge-building is not his agenda. The project with which Rauf...

Could Scott Pelley possibly be this naive, or was he willingly playing the role of MSM cheerleader for the developer of the Ground Zero Mosque? In the course of a chummy interview of GZM developer Sharif El-Gamal aired on Sunday's 60 Minutes, Pelley produced a pearl. Instead of asking a probing question, the CBS "reporter" served as an advocate for El-Gamal's position when it came to the siting of the mosque. Pelley, on his own initiative, asserted: "You don't have your choice of putting this anywhere you want to. There aren't many spots." View video here.

The mosque developers are tax deadbeats. Sharif El-Gamal, the leading organizer behind the mosque and community center near Ground Zero, owes $224,270.77 in back property tax on the site, city records show. El-Gamal's company, 45 Park Place Partners, failed to pay its half-yearly bills in January and July, according to the city Finance Department. The delinquency is a possible violation of El-Gamal's lease with Con Edison, which owns half of the proposed building site on Park Place. El-Gamal owns the other half but must pay taxes on the entire parcel.

Great news for the New York housing market -- landlords are finally the good guys! Yes, wise old Mayor Bloomberg and our beloved President Obama have just given their warmest good wishes for landlords to collect unpaid rent by storming in, screaming curses and beating the heck out of their tenants. And the news gets even better, landlords -- your brother is allowed to do it too! Yes, just act like Sharif el-Gamal, the developer of the Ground Zero Mosque, and punch your brother's tenant so hard you break his nose and cheekbones, and America's ruling class will fall at...

The more we learn about the developer the less likely it seems the mosque will get off the ground. The NY Post reports that Gamal has a signficant unpaid tax bill : Sharif El-Gamal, the leading organizer behind the mosque and community center near Ground Zero, owes $224,270.77 in back property tax on the site, city records show. El-Gamal's company, 45 Park Place Partners, failed to pay its half-yearly bills in January and July, according to the city Finance Department. The delinquency is a possible violation of El-Gamal's lease with Con Edison, which owns half of the proposed building site...

NEW YORK (AP) -- The developer behind plans to build an Islamic community center and mosque two blocks from ground zero kicked off fundraising for the project Friday by raising $10,000 in just a few minutes from a congregation of Muslim worshippers. Sharif El-Gamal announced the start of the funding drive at the conclusion of Friday prayer sessions that have been taking place since last year in the vacant Manhattan clothing store that is to be torn down to make way for the new center.

Park51 developer Sharif El-Gamal, accidental protagonist of the most politicized real estate story in recent memory, sat behind the blond-wood desk in his office six floors above the lower Broadway mall, and, meaty hands clasped before him, held forth on what it takes to make it in real estate. After all, it is real estate—not fanning national anti-Muslim hysteria—that is Mr. El-Gamal's actual business. "You know, the real estate business is a very tough business, and you have to be patient and persistent, and aggressive, and thank God I have all those qualities," said Mr. El-Gamal, who looks something like...

SNIP Sharif El-Gamal is the developer behind the plan to erect an Islamic community center and mosque two blocks from the World Trade Center site. Calls are mounting for him and the other backers to find a new home for their center, further away from the site of the September 11th terrorist attacks, but El-Gamal isn't budging. He is sticking with his plans to erect a 13-story center and prayer space in Lower Manhattan. He likens the project to a YMCA or Jewish Community Center, with programs open to all residents of all faiths. "A landmark, an iconic building that...

After weeks of heated debate over plans for an Islamic community center near Ground Zero - the site of the 9/11 attacks on New York - it seems Muslim leaders will soon back down, agreeing to move to a new site. ...

Sponsors of the proposed mosque near Ground Zero are not slamming the door on Gov. Paterson's idea to build the center someplace else. "We are open to a conversation to find out more on what the governor has in mind," the center, Park51, said in a Twitter post yesterday. SNIP Mosque developer Sharif El-Gamal has said the group is interested in hearing from Paterson but added that "this has always been about serving lower Manhattan." He did not return calls and emails yesterday. SNIP

Mysterious Group Buys Building Next to Ground Zero For Mosque Wednesday, December 16, 2009 Jim Hoft A mysterous Muslim group with unknown sponsors has purchased a building steps away from Ground Zero. Hudson New York reported: An identified group with unknown sponsors has purchased building steps away from where the WorldTrade Center once stood — to turn it into potentially one of the largest New York City mosques. At the moment the building, the old Burlington Coat Factory, already serves as a mini-mosque: an iron grill lifts every Friday afternoon for a little known Imam leading prayers a few yards...