A mosque proposal frays interfaith relations in Illinois

MORTON GROVE, Ill. -- This quiet, middle-class suburb just north of Chicago has long enjoyed a reputation for religious and ethnic tolerance. After the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Jewish and Christian residents reached out to members of its Islamic community, inviting them to interfaith services at a time when many Muslims were in fear of becoming the target of hate crimes.

That has changed. A fight has broken out over the proposed expansion of a Muslim school that moved into a shuttered public school 15 years ago. Now, the most talked-about interfaith gatherings in town are conflict-resolution sessions, led by a federal mediator from the Justice Department.

Both sides have voiced hope that they can work out the issues. "Our interaction with the other religious organizations has been positive," says Mohammed Kaiseruddin, the president of the nonprofit school's governing body, the Muslim Community Center of Chicago.

"I find the Muslims to be the most responsible citizens and the most pleasant hosts," says the Rev. Michael Winters of the Morton Grove Community Church. "We're hoping as the years go by there will be greater Islamic participation."

Such efforts were born of an area that some still call "Little Israel." The suburb of Skokie, which has one of the nation's highest concentrations of Holocaust survivors and their descendants, is next door.

The local high schools regularly hold pageants to celebrate their ethnic diversity. Now, residents are waiting to see whether a similar level of acceptance can assuage animosity that surfaced after village officials turned down the Muslim Education Center's expansion proposal.

"The image of our community is one that is welcome to diversity and we have had a cordial relationship with the MEC for years," says Bridget Wachtel, the assistant village planner. "This is simply a dispute over the facility and what can fit on the site."

Outside consultants had said "the site is simply not large enough" to support the proposed expansion. Some residents say the site with the mosque would require 10 acres, rather than the Muslim Education Center's current four.

Despite that ruling last spring, village officials could still amend the zoning code and the center still hopes to build a mosque on the property. In a $5 million lawsuit, school officials say the village violated the federal Religious Land-Use and Institutionalized Persons Act of 2000 by unlawfully restricting religious assembly.

The officials say that the action is necessary to "prevent a dangerous precedent for other Muslim communities and Islamic Centers across the nation."

Residents who live around the mosque now say their constitutional rights have been violated because the village has bent over backward in allowing the Muslims to repeatedly violate village parking regulations. Douglas Cannon, a lawyer for the residents, has submitted as evidence photos of cars parked two deep on streets around the school during Friday afternoon prayer services, which regularly draw 400 to 800 Muslims from throughout the Midwest.

"They have every right to expect to be able to build a mosque," said Patrick Kansoer, a member of a group opposing the mosque. "I'm hopeful there's a way to find a way to accommodate what they want and what we want. I understand Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world, but I don't understand the great deal of urgency on their part."

Members of the nonprofit school's governing board began fund-raising efforts for the proposed mosque in 2001, and had applied for permits to build by November 2002. A few weeks later, the school's imam, Elkheir Elkheir, accepted an invitation to read from the Koran as part of the annual interfaith Thanksgiving service at a local Roman Catholic church, and overall neighborhood relations seemed fine.

But three days before Christmas, a cinder block was thrown through the front window of the Muslim school at 4 a.m., and tensions began to rise.

At the first of several public hearings on the mosque plan two months later, Muslim school leaders were upbeat as they unveiled a presentation of the $3 million project. Kaiseruddin told the crowd: "We are very excited. We have always had a desire to have a prayer hall attached to the school."

In anticipation of a large crowd, the meeting had been moved from the Village Hall to the 300-person capacity American Legion Hall, where it was still standing-room only.

Many residents expressed concerns regarding what they called the "side issue" of outside funding. "I read that most of the mosques in France are being built with money from Saudi Arabia, from the Saudi royal family, and is that the case with you?" one resident asked Kaiseruddin, who has said that funding for the mosque would not come from outside the United States. Students often pass around collection boxes at Friday services.

John Mauck, a lawyer for the Muslim Education Center, says the learning process for residents has been gradual. "That's not the question that would be asked if the Vatican were sending money for a church," Mauck said of the Saudi funding question. "To say that type of thing, I think people aren't thinking through whether they're being biased in their fears."

The Muslim school, which is accredited by the state, teaches math, science, languages, and Islamic studies to kindergarten through eighth-grade students. As for physical education classes, "Right now, they finish games, then we lay the carpet and start praying. The children would love to have a mosque so they can be proud of saying we pray in a mosque instead of a gym," said Farhat Quadri, a Chicago Muslim leader who also chairs the council that runs adult classes on evenings and weekends.

The mediation sessions are part of a broader civil rights investigation in Morton Grove. As part of it, the FBI has under lab analysis a pair of letters threatening village officials and individuals who have opposed the mosque plan. "There's been no claim of responsibility. They haven't been tied to anyone," said a Chicago FBI spokesman, Ross Rice.

All of this has put a strain on community relations. "There's a tension in the air. I think it's a shame because Morton Grove has always had a reputation of live and let live," said Rabbi Kenneth Cohen of the Northwest Suburban Jewish Congregation. "It's their right to have a decent place to pray. But the timing of when they all of a sudden start talking about building a mosque, you have to be extremely naive to think it's not going to provoke some issues, perhaps undeservedly, but that's the way it is."

Two months ago the Chicagoland Jewish High School, which is a mile west from the Muslim school, hosted an interfaith group of students at a "hospitality dinner" of potato pancakes, falafel, and conversation about shared tenets of their faiths.

The same group had met at the Muslim school in November, and there has been no pressure to make political discourse a part of it, says David Schultz, the coordinator of student activities at the Jewish school.

"It is less about addressing issues of contemporary conflict than showing hospitality by learning about each other," he said. "As relationships develop, the kids will go there organically."