Pro-Mosque Mom Who Lost Pregnant Daughter In Trade Center: 9/11 Families 'Not Monolithic'http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/08/pro-mosque-mom-who-lost-pregnant-daughter-in-trade-center-911-families-not-monolithic.phpAs plans to build an Islamic cultural center near Ground Zero in New York City become political fodder for the fall elections on a national scale, it's become shorthand to imply that all 9/11 families oppose the erection of the mosque two blocks from the site where terrorists downed the World Trade Center nearly nine years ago.
But in fact, no cohesive position has emerged from the thousands of 9/11 families who have been politically influential on many issues in the past. One group which has opposed war has come out strongly in favor of the mosque project, known as Cordoba House. Others have avoided even addressing the issue.
"There is no simple, singular 9/11 group who really should or could speak for all 9/11 family members," said Donna Marsh O'Connor of September Eleventh Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, a coalition of more than 250 families which recently endorsed the mosque. Since the endorsement, the membership numbers have grown, she said.
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O'Connor told TPM in an interview that it's unfair for groups like Debra Burlingame's 9/11 Families for a Safe and Strong America to act as if they are representing everyone who lost loved ones in the attacks. O'Connor's 29-year-old daughter Vanessa, pregnant at the time, was killed working on the 93rd floor of one of the twin towers.