St. Pete for Peace says they’ll go to Gainesville and hold vigil on same day that local church plans to burn copies of the Koran

Although the proposed Muslim cultural center called Park51 in Lower Manhattan has dropped from the front pages of the national news over the past couple of weeks, the issue of Islamaphobia is very much alive and well throughout the country.

The NY Times reported Wednesday that a group of teenagers in western New York were accused of harassing members of a mosque by yelling obscenities and insults during evening prayers for Ramadan, sideswiping with a member of the mosque with a vehicle and firing a shotgun outside.

There have others incidents, such as in Murfreesboro, Tennessee, and  the upcoming situation at a church in Gainsville that has said for weeks that they intend to burn copies of the Koran on September 11.

The local activist group, St. Pete for Peace, now says that they journey to Gainesville on September 11 to hold a peaceful vigil across the street from the planned desecration.

This article appears in Aug 26 – Sep 1, 2010.