Obama to make first visit to a U.S. mosque during his presidency on Wednesday

Sunday 31 Jan 2016 - 11:01 Makkah mean time-21-4-1437

President Obama during his visit to the National Mosque of Malaysia in Kuala Lumpur, on April 27, 2014. Image from Reuters

Washington, (IINA) - US President Barack Obama will make the first visit during his presidency to a U.S. mosque this week, the White House announced on Saturday.
On Wednesday, the president will visit the Islamic Society of Baltimore, a sprawling community center in the city’s western suburbs that serves thousands of people with a place of worship, a housing complex and schools, according to its website, The Washington Post reported.
It is one of the Mid-Atlantic region’s largest Muslim centers and describes itself as aspiring “to be the anchor of a growing Muslim community with diverse backgrounds, democratically governed, relating to one another with inclusiveness and tolerance, and interacting with neighbors in an Islamic exemplary manner.”
The president is making the visit “to celebrate the contributions Muslim Americans make to our nation and reaffirm the importance of religious freedom to our way of life,” a White House official wrote in an email Saturday. “The President believes that one of our nation’s greatest strengths is our rich diversity and the very idea that Americans of different faiths and backgrounds can thrive together  that we’re all part of the same American family. As the President has said, Muslim Americans are our friends, and neighbors; our co-workers, and sports heroes and our men and women in uniform defending our country.”
At the Islamic Society, the president will hold a roundtable discussion with community members, the official said.
“When politicians insult Muslims, whether abroad or our fellow citizens, when a mosque is vandalized or a kid bullied, that doesn’t make us safer,” Obama said in his State of the Union address earlier this month. “That’s not telling it like it is. It’s just wrong.
“It diminishes us in the eyes of the world. It makes it harder to achieve our goals. It betrays who we are as a country.”
Obama has visited mosques overseas, but never one in this country while serving as president.
“I think it would be enormously comforting and also send powerful message to Americans about recommitting to religious freedom especially if we had Bush and Obama visit together,” Farhana Khera, executive director of Muslim Advocates, a legal advocacy group, said last month when she met with the president’s aides.
Obama’s relationship with American Muslims has been complicated. They are among his most enthusiastic backers, but some feel he has not done enough to address their concerns at a time of social unrest.
However, concern about profiling and domestic surveillance at mosques has escalated under Obama, and some Muslim leaders expressed concern last year when he held a key summit about violent extremism that focused significantly on Muslim extremism.
SM/IINA

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