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NEW YORK: A mosque and a nearby store run by Muslim immigrants were among four sites hit by suspected arsonists in a single New York neighborhood late Sunday, police said Monday.
A spokesman for the New York Police Department said the Imam Al-Khoei Foundation building in the borough of Queens suffered damage to the front door from a Molotov cocktail.
The foundation, which describes itself as the biggest international Shia Muslim organization, said on its website that two firebombs were “hurled at the main entrance” but that thankfully “no major damage no injury was caused by the blast.”
In a slightly earlier incident in the same part of New York, a general store known in New York as a bodega was struck with a similar device, consisting of a still-undetermined inflammable liquid in a glass Starbucks cafe bottle, a police spokesman said.
A source close to the investigation, who asked not to be identified, said that “the employees are Muslim.”
A third incident, occurring just one hour after the mosque attack, saw the same Starbucks bottle and accelerant weapon thrown at a private home used by a Hindu priest for ceremonies, police said. Nothing outside the house indicates its dual use as a temple, police said.
The fourth and most serious attack of the evening ended with a major fire at a private home, although there was no proof of links between this and the other incidents.
“There were no injuries, but there was extensive damage,” a police spokesman said.
The source with the investigation said that in this case arson was suspected, but there was no indication of the same firebombs being used.
The inhabitants, who were lucky to escape unharmed, were Christian and had no connection to the mosque or to the bodega, the source said.
