Fifty years to the day of the first manned space orbit and 30 years to the day Columbia blasted off on the first shuttle mission, the Sunshine State celebrated the news that space shuttle Atlantis will be coming home to stay.

NASA announced Tuesday that Atlantis would have its permanent retirement home at Florida's Kennedy Space Center.

A coalition of pro-Israel activists is calling for the ouster of a Florida Atlantic University professor with ties to a controversial Islamic center near campus.

Bassem Alhalabi is "a very dangerous professor who has ties to terrorists," said Joe Kaufman, head of Americans Against Hate. There is plenty of documented evidence that shows that Professor Bassem Alhalabi does not merit employment at FAU."

Kaufman's group, along with the Church of All Nations and the Christian Family Coalition, has scheduled a Thursday protest at FAU's Boca Raton campus.