America AFTER
BEFORE
MIDEAST MONEY PIT The Amr Ibn El-Aas Mosque in Cairo, Egypt, was restored using funds from USAID.
Uncle Sam’s Middle East Mosque Fix
Restoring religious icons of foreign nations seems to be a priority of the State Department.
T BY ANDREW HENRY
he state department is defending its con- troversial practice of spending millions of dollars to refurbish overseas mosques and minarets — as well as churches and temples.
Many taxpayers are unaware the “Ambassadors Fund
for Cultural Preservation” has spent millions on restoring the religious icons of foreign nations as a means of dem- onstrating what the State Department calls “our nation’s respect for the cultural heritage of other countries.”
16 NEWSMAX | FEBRUARY 2012 Some of its restoration projects have been particular-
ly controversial. Take, for example, the Amr Ibn El-Aas Mosque in Cairo, which was built in 642 by a Muslim warrior who conquered Egypt’s ancient Christians in a crusade-like campaign. “Saudi Arabia and the other Gulf states . . . are swim-
ming in petro-dollars,” said author and columnist Andrew C. McCarthy on The Corner blog. “Why can’t they fund icons of Islamic supremacism on their own?” As McCar- thy’s broadside suggests, taxpayer watchdogs, fi scal
AFTER/KHALED EL-FIQI/EPA/NEWSCOM / BEFORE/COURTESY OF USAID/WAFAA FALTAOUS
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