{"id":285613,"date":"2017-02-08T17:37:42","date_gmt":"2017-02-09T00:37:42","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/?p=285613"},"modified":"2017-02-08T17:37:42","modified_gmt":"2017-02-09T00:37:42","slug":"fire-that-ravaged-texas-mosque-was-arson-investigators-say","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/2017\/02\/fire-that-ravaged-texas-mosque-was-arson-investigators-say\/","title":{"rendered":"Fire that ravaged Texas mosque was arson, investigators say"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Mosque

Bob Daemmrich \/ The Texas Tribune<\/p>

The FBI, ATF and other agencies sift through the burned remains of the Victoria Islamic Center a mosque in Victoria on Jan. 29.<\/p><\/div>\n

Investigators said Wednesday that someone intentionally set the fire that destroyed a mosque two weeks ago in Victoria, the South Texas town that has since rallied around its Muslim community.<\/p>\n

But experts still don\u2019t know who set the blaze, the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms said in a news release. Meanwhile, the bureau \u2014 along with the Victoria Islamic Center and Crime Stoppers \u2014 are offering up to $30,000 for information leading to the arrest and indictment of the arsonist.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt this time, the evidence does not indicate the fire was a biased crime,\u201d the news release said.<\/p>\n

Federal, state and local agencies are investigating the Jan. 28 blaze, which grabbed international headlines in part because it roared through the mosque hours after President Donald Trump signed his executive order barring refugees from entering the country and restricting travel from seven Muslim-majority countries.<\/p>\n

The fire completely engulfed the Victoria Islamic Center\u2019s 16-year-old mosque, taking its financial and legal records with it, and causing about $500,000 in damage.<\/p>\n

The charred mosque has become a symbol of the town’s unity<\/a>;\u00a0hundreds of people have gathered there to support the Muslim community. And people around the world have donated more than $1.1 million to aid in the cleanup and rebuilding. The Islamic Center says it will give away any extra donations after it clears the rubble and rebuilds a new place of worship.<\/p>\n

Congregation members are \u201c<\/span>saddened and alarmed by the outcome of the investigation,\u201d the center said in a statement Wednesday. \u201cDespite several indications of arson, we offered prayers of hope that the cause of fire would be accident rather than intentional act.\u201d \u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

In an interview outside of the ash and rubble last week, the center\u2019s president Dr. Shahid Hashmi, told the Tribune that his community would forgive anyone found to have set the fire. \u201cBut there\u2019s no way we can forget. There\u2019s no way our children can forget,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

This article originally appeared in The Texas Tribune<\/a>,\u00a0a nonpartisan, nonprofit media organization that informs Texans and engages with them about public policy, politics, government and statewide issues.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Investigators said Wednesday that someone intentionally set the fire that destroyed a mosque two weeks ago in Victoria, the South Texas town that has since rallied around its Muslim community. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":285618,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[142,177],"class_list":["post-285613","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news-and-analysis","tag-crime","tag-religion"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285613","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=285613"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/285613\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/285618"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=285613"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=285613"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nmpolitics.net\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=285613"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}