US News

‘Ground Zero’ imam on Mideast tour to make Islam ‘Americanized’

WASHINGTON — The imam behind the plan to build a mosque near Ground Zero surfaced yesterday far from the controversy — in Bahrain, where he’s on a taxpayer-funded trip to the Middle East to spread good will.

Appearing in public for the first time in weeks, Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf, speaking at a mosque near Bahrain’s capital of Manama, said he wants to “Americanize” Islam — but dodged questions about the uproar over his planned mosque and community center.

Rauf spoke against fanaticism, saying, “This issue of extremism is something that has been a national-security issue — not only for the United States but also for many countries and nations in the Muslim world.”

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“This is why this particular trip has a great importance because all countries in the Muslim world — as well as the Western world — are facing this . . . major security challenge,” Rauf told Associated Press Television News in a brief interview.

The cleric also said he was working on a way to “Americanize Islam,” but didn’t offer any details.

Rauf noted that many different interpretations of the faith have emerged over the last 1,400 years.

“The same principles and rituals were everywhere, but what happened in different regions was there were different interpretations,” he said.

“So we recognize that our heritage allows for re-expressing the internal principles of our religion in different cultural times and places.”

Some of the imam’s American critics said they fear he is using the State Department-sponsored trip to raise money and rally support in the Muslim world for the mosque.

“I think there is no place for this,” said the Rev. Franklin Graham, who is the son of evangelist Billy Graham and opposes the Ground Zero mosque.

“Can you imagine if the State Department paid to send me on a trip anywhere? The separation of church and state — the critics would have been howling.”

US officials have said they instructed Rauf not to fund-raise for the mosque during his trip.

Rauf’s wife, Daisy Khan, nixed talk of plans to move the project from the planned site two blocks from Ground Zero, despite a push for a “compromise” location by many New York officials, including Gov. Paterson.

“Dropping the plan is definitely not an option at all,” she said, adding that organizers were consulting with American Muslim leaders on how to proceed.

“We know that we have the right to do this, but what is right for the larger community, or the larger good of the larger Muslim community?” she said.

Meanwhile, representatives of the mosque said they never planned to meet with Paterson over his offer to help find an alternative site — flatly contradicting the governor’s claim that a meeting had been set.

Paterson has been seeking a meeting with the Cordoba Initiative developers since Aug. 10, when he floated the idea of conveying state land for a mosque.

This is Rauf’s fourth US-sponsored trip to the region, according to the State Department.

He traveled twice to the Mideast in 2007 during the administration of President George W. Bush and once earlier this year.

As part of his latest trip during the holy month of Ramadan, Rauf will also visit Qatar and the United Arab Emirates to talk about Muslim life in America.

The trip is estimated to cost $16,000 and is funded by the State Department’s Bureau of International Information Programs.

geoff.earle@nypost.com