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At a news conference earlier in the day, Imam Muhammad Musri, the president of the Islamic Society of Central Florida, condemned the attack and called for prayers for the victims.

Syed Shafeeq Rahman, the Imam at Islamic center of Fort Pierce, Florida, where shooter Omar Mateen worshiped, told ABC News in an on-camera interview that Mateen had been worshiping there for about 10 years, and that his personality had changed over time, becoming more withdrawn.

Rahman said that Mateen, who died in a gun battle with police, would bring his young son there, a toddler, and that his parents, who were born in Afghanistan, also worshiped at the mosque.

\"PHOTO:
Myspace
PHOTO: Orlando shooting suspect Omar Mateen is pictured in an undated photo from Myspace.
>

In a statement made this afternoon, FBI Agent-in-charge Ron Hopper said Mateen had been interviewed by the FBI in 2014 because of alleged ties to the U.S. suicide bomber Moner Abusalha. Abusalha, son of a Palestinian father and American mother, also grew up in Florida, where his friends called him \"Mo.” On May 25 2014, at the age of 22, Abusalha died while driving a truck packed with explosives into a government outpost in Syria and detonating the charge.

Metwally insisted that men like Mateen and Abusalha do not represent the lives of Floridian Muslims. He said that he \"couldn't breathe\" under the government of then-Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser, and sought out a new home in America to be free of oppression. He said that he and other members of his mosque cannot understand the logic of a Muslim who would want to harm America.

\"I came here on purpose and this is my home,\" he said, emotion rising in his voice. \"Why would anyone want to harm the U.S.?\"

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