Taroudant, Morocco- The film "The Rise of Al Qaeda" that will be presented on May 21 at the opening of the National September 11 Memorial Museum caused an uproar among an "advisory group made up of clergy from different faiths" for it "unfairly links Islam and terrorism," according to Associated Press.
The film, a short documentary, refers to the terrorists, who were behind the attacks of the 9/11, as Islamists who viewed their attacks as jihad.
The same source added that the members of the clergy group sent a letter to museum officials this week demanding that the video be edited to show that not all Muslims are responsible for the 2001 attacks and not all of them have the same convictions as those of Al Qaeda.
“We continue to posit that the video may very well leave viewers with the impression that all Muslims bear some collective guilt or responsibility for the actions of al-Qaida, or even misinterpret its content to justify bigotry or even violence toward Muslims or those perceived to be Muslim (e.g., Sikhs),” the clergy members wrote as reported by Associated Press.
Sheikh Mostafa Elazabawy, the imam of Masjid Manhattan, who resigned from the museum’s advisory panel last month to protest the film, wrote in a separate letter to the museum’s director saying that “the screening of this film in its present state would greatly offend our local Muslim believers as well as any foreign Muslim visitor to the museum.”
The film, approximately seven minutes long, is a documentary narrated by NBC News anchor Brian Williams with images and scenes of Al Qaeda training and attacks.
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