The Associated Press, the largest news-gathering organization in the world, has issued an edict to staffers not to refer to the Cordoba House Islamic Cultural Center as the "Ground Zero mosque."

But that is precisely what it is, no matter what political-correctness police at the AP claim.

The AP is siding with proponents of the Ground Zero mosque with this decision, claiming the site of the existing Burlington Coat Factory building is nearly two blocks from the old World Trade Center destroyed in the 9/11 attack by Islamic terrorists.

What the AP overlooks, however, is that the Burlington Coat Factory has been shut down since 9/11 because part of one of the airliners used in the attack on the World Trade Center actually struck the building.

The World Trade Center towers were toppled. But the Burlington Coat Factory, while shuttered, remains standing. It should either be repaired and declared a historic landmark or be replaced by something other than a mosque.

Why?

The unacceptable symbolism of replacing the Burlington Coat Factory with a mosque is even more compelling than the idea of building a mosque at the former site of the World Trade Center.

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In effect, by tearing down this building to make way for a mosque constructed with foreign Islamic money and leadership linked to Islamic extremism, Americans would be consenting to the completion of the audacious and insidious attack of Sept. 11, 2001.

I must give credit to a friend and colleague of mine, the best radio producer in America, Franklin Raff of the "G. Gordon Liddy Show," for noticing this oversight even among those dead-set against the idea of the Ground Zero mosque.

The World Trade Center is gone. The Burlington Coat Factory is still standing.

Wouldn't Islamists around the world love to see the devastating attack of 9/11 result in even more destruction a decade later with the bulldozing of a landmark building only damaged on that date and replaced with a trophy mosque?

Again, the symbolism is so striking I'm shocked that no one else has yet made this point.

Spokesmen for the Ground Zero mosque have stated that the history associated with the building was the reason the site was selected. Daisy Khan, executive director of the American Society of Muslim Advancement and a board member of the Cordoba Initiative told the Associated Press this as recorded in a story published in USA Today May 7 of this year.

"We want to create a platform by which the voices of the mainstream and silent majority of Muslims will be amplified. A center of this scale and magnitude will do that," Khan said. "We feel it's an obligation of Muslims and Americans to be part of the rebuilding of downtown Manhattan."

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In other words, it wasn't the proximity of the Burlington Coat Factory building to the World Trade Center that made it appealing, it was the fact that it was actually damaged in the attack that made it the ideal site for a mosque.

Robert Spencer, author of "Stealth Jihad: How Radical Islam is Subverting America Without Guns or Bombs" and an opponent of the mosque, agrees that's why the site was chosen.

"The idea here that will be widely understood is that this mosque is another triumphal mosque, another victory mosque [like] the Dome of the Rock and the al-Aqsa Mosque on the site of the Temple Mount and the Umayyad Mosque in Damascus," Spencer told WND.

"The reason for the interest in this property in particular is its iconic status in relation to the 9/11 attacks. This is something Imam Rauf has said himself. It's not something I'm attributing to him," Spencer explained. "In his own words he said, 'New York is the capital of the world and this location close to 9/11 is iconic.' He was happy that his mosque would be at the site of the building [where] the wreckage fell on 9/11."

Rauf calls it "iconic."

I call it "completing the attack."

You decide.