MTA agrees to bus ads by Ground Zero mosque opponents

The MTA Monday announced it had agreed to allow opponents of a planned mosque near Ground Zero to run ads on New York City buses.

The announcement came three days after two organizations, the American Freedom Defense Initiative and Stop Islamization of America, sued the MTA for refusing to run their ads. The Metropolitan Transportation Authority initially said the ad's imagery was too closely associated with the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

The ad, as shown on the groups' websites, depicts a plane flying into a smoking World Trade Center tower beside a rendering of the mosque proposed to be built a few blocks from the site. The words "Why there?" appear between the two structures.

In an apparent about-face, the MTA statement Monday said that while it "does not endorse the views expressed in this or other ads that appear on the transit system," the groups' ad was accepted "after its review under MTA's advertising guidelines and governing legal standards."

Conservative blogger Pamela Geller, who heads Stop Islamization of America, said Monday she was "thrilled" with the MTA's decision.

"They knew they would lose," Geller said. "This is a freedom of speech issue. They knew it, or they never would have caved so quickly."

Geller said she originally agreed to tone down the ad, including removing the image of a plane and of the smoke near the World Trade Center tower. But, she said, the MTA's decision clears the way for the ad to appear as originally designed.

The ad, for which the groups paid about $10,000, will appear on 30 buses in New York City for about a month, including during the ninth anniversary of the attacks next month, Geller said.

The mosque is set to be built two blocks from the site of the World Trade Center. Real-estate developer Sharif El-Gamal, one of the main forces behind the mosque project, now called Park51, could not be reached for comment Monday.