The New York Times reported in January that as part of the U.S. strategy in Afghanistan, some infantry units are paying locals to rebuild infrastructure and renovate mosques.

American taxpayer money is being used to build mosques and otherwise promote Islam, according to a conservative watchdog group, a Washington newspaper and a Middle East commentator.

The American Center for Law and Justice has called on the U.S. State Department to remove Feisal Abdul Rauf, the imam behind the proposed mosque near Ground Zero in New York, from a taxpayer-funded trip to the Middle East to discuss Muslim life in America and religious tolerance.

“This shows a tremendous lack of judgment on behalf of the State Department and for the American taxpayers to be funding this global journey is not only wrong, but deeply offensive,” Jay Sekulow, ACLJ’s chief counsel, said Aug. 10. “We demand that the State Department put a halt to the imam’s participation in this publicly-funded trip.”

Rauf has refused to declare Hamas a terrorist organization, the ACLJ news release said, and in the days following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, he said U.S. foreign policy could be considered an “accessory” to the tragedy.

State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said Rauf will travel to Qatar, Bahrain and the United Arab Emirates in an effort sponsored by the U.S. government’s Bureau of International Information Programs.

[Editor’s note: This article is incomplete. The source for this document was originally published on bpnews.net—however, the original URL is no longer available.]