Mosques in U.S. to Remain Closed Despite Order by Trump

The American magazine Newsweek said that US mosques will remain closed during the coming period, despite the order of US President Donald Trump to open all places of worship in the country, and

The American magazine Newsweek said that US mosques will remain closed during the coming period, despite the order of US President Donald Trump to open all places of worship in the country, and his threat to state governors if they do not abide by his decision.

The biggest Islamic civil rights and advocacy organization in the U.S. has suggested there is a degree of irony in President Donald Trump deeming a mosque an “essential” place that should reopen, having once instigated a ban on Muslims entering the country.

Some religious communities have greeted with caution the order by Trump to reopen places of worship. He said he had instructed the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to issue guidance for churches, synagogues, mosques and places where adherents of other faiths can gather, to open their doors again after the coronavirus shutdown.

“Ministers, pastors, rabbis, imams and other faith leaders will make sure that their congregations are safe as they gather and pray,” Trump said in the announcement on Friday, describing them as “essential places that provide essential services.”

However, Ibrahim Hooper, communications director of the Council on American–Islamic Relations said that the country’s Muslim schools and community leaders “have already determined that mosques will not be open in the near future because of the health concerns brought on by the pandemic.

“That’s a determination for them to make, not for the president to make,” he said, according to NPR. “I don’t anticipate any mosques changing plans based on what was said by the guy who launched the Muslim ban,” Hooper said, referring to the executive order issued in January 2017 which sought to ban the entry of foreign nationals from several Muslim majority countries.

While some mosques, including in Houston, Texas, will open their doors to a limited number of worshipers, most Muslim communities in the United States have resorted to technology to celebrate Eid al-Fitr after the end of Ramadan.