Athens – Islamic Research and Information Center (IRIC) https://iric.org Mon, 28 Aug 2023 07:40:06 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.2.14 https://iric.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/iric-favicon.png Athens – Islamic Research and Information Center (IRIC) https://iric.org 32 32 It took a century to open a mosque in Athens. Then came the pandemic. https://iric.org/it-took-a-century-to-open-a-mosque-in-athens-then-came-the-pandemic/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=it-took-a-century-to-open-a-mosque-in-athens-then-came-the-pandemic https://iric.org/it-took-a-century-to-open-a-mosque-in-athens-then-came-the-pandemic/#respond Fri, 13 Nov 2020 18:26:19 +0000 https://demo.iric.org/?p=21350 The mosque that took more than a century to open, surviving legal, political and financial challenges, has closed in less than a week, a temporary victim of the coronavirus pandemic.

Athens, the Greek capital, had not had a dedicated, purpose-built Muslim place of worship since the expulsion of Ottoman forces in 1833, a gap that officials have long sought to fill. The first act of Parliament aimed at opening a mosque came in 1890, an effort that intensified in recent decades as the Muslim community has grown, now praying in dozens of unpermitted, makeshift venues like basements, garages and parking lots.

In the face of objections from the powerful Orthodox Church, and from nationalists who associate Islam with foreign occupation, plans repeatedly came to nothing over the years, leaving Athens as virtually the only European Union capital without a purpose-built place of worship for Muslims.

But in 2006 Parliament approved construction of a fully state-funded, state-run mosque in Athens — the only such arrangement in the European Union, Greek officials say. The opening, initially scheduled for 2010, finally arrived early this month after the project surmounted a mountain of red tape and legal challenges.

With coronavirus spiking, though, restrictions immediately limited a building designed for around 350 worshipers to only 13 at a time. Then, the day after the mosque’s first Friday Prayer, Greece returned to a national lockdown, forcing it to shut completely for now.

The closing heightened the bittersweet feelings many Muslims already had about the state-funded mosque — a squat off-white building, conspicuously free of minarets, set on a sprawling former naval base in an industrial district near downtown Athens. Its 4.2-acre grounds include a park with a fountain and a playground.

Source: The New York Times

]]> https://iric.org/it-took-a-century-to-open-a-mosque-in-athens-then-came-the-pandemic/feed/ 0 After waiting for decades, Muslims in Athens finally get a mosque https://iric.org/after-waiting-for-decades-muslims-in-athens-finally-get-a-mosque/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=after-waiting-for-decades-muslims-in-athens-finally-get-a-mosque https://iric.org/after-waiting-for-decades-muslims-in-athens-finally-get-a-mosque/#respond Thu, 06 Jun 2019 06:13:33 +0000 https://demo.iric.org/?p=20648 Without minaret or dome, the beige, rectangular structure in a former industrial area has none of the ornate grace typical of Islamic places of worship. But for the Muslims of Athens, it is the result of a long-fought battle – and the city’s first formal mosque in more than 180 years.

Greek authorities said on Friday that Athens would open its first official mosque probably by September when the 850,000 euro ($967,000) construction project is completed.

Although there are mosques in other parts of Greece, the capital has not had a formal mosque since it drove out occupying Ottomans in 1833, and the few that are left have been repurposed. Plans to build a mosque began in 1890 with an act of parliament, but all fell through, including one timed for the 2004 Olympics.

More than 200,000 Muslims from countries including Pakistan, Syria, Afghanistan and Bangladesh live in the Greek capital, according to Muslim groups. Greece has its own Muslim community which represent about 2% of the population who live mainly in the north where they have their own mosques. Efforts over the years to build a mosque in Athens sparked protests from fringe groups on the far right; a short distance from the mosque, graffiti scrawled on a wall read “Islam Out”.

Source: Reuters

]]> https://iric.org/after-waiting-for-decades-muslims-in-athens-finally-get-a-mosque/feed/ 0 With construction of a new mosque, Greek Muslims look to come out of the shadows https://iric.org/with-construction-of-a-new-mosque-greek-muslims-look-to-come-out-of-the-shadows/?utm_source=rss&utm_medium=rss&utm_campaign=with-construction-of-a-new-mosque-greek-muslims-look-to-come-out-of-the-shadows https://iric.org/with-construction-of-a-new-mosque-greek-muslims-look-to-come-out-of-the-shadows/#respond Sun, 06 Nov 2016 06:37:51 +0000 https://iric.org/?p=28470 Shah Malik ducks to enter a space that, from the street, looks like any other storefront in the central Omonia district. The neighborhood — with blocks of shops offering imported spices, halal meat or the milky tea popular in South Asia — is home to immigrants from Afghanistan, Pakistan and Bangladesh. It’s time for evening prayers, and Malik, who came to Greece from Pakistan 14 years ago, heads to the local mosque. “It’s like not having a set place to live, when you don’t have a mosque for people to gather,” he said.

Masjid Usman, as a handwritten sign taped beside the entrance reads, is actually registered as a library. At least 200,000 Muslims live in Athens, but of the 120 prayer spaces in the city, only three have been able to navigate a complex maze of legal restrictions to register as mosques. The rest, like Masjid Usman, operate as libraries or cultural centers — instead of as nonprofit places of worship that enjoy a range of legal protections in Greece — and could one day be shut down if authorities decide to enforce the law.

But last month, Greek authorities announced a contract had been awarded for the construction of a state-funded, properly registered mosque — the first since the nation’s independence from the Ottoman Empire nearly 200 years ago. The mosque, expected to cost about $1 million, will have capacity for around 300 worshippers and is being built in a former naval repair yard in the Votanikos neighborhood of Athens, west of downtown.

“We have been hearing about this for decades,” said Malik, who serves as the makeshift mosque’s treasurer, “and if it happens, if it actually gets constructed, it would be great. It would allow us to feel like we can have an open presence here.”

Arab diplomats in Athens have been trying to get permission to build a mosque since the 1970s, and for more than a decade the Greek government has been trying to find space for such a facility, but anti-immigrant groups and the powerful Greek Orthodox Church have hampered the efforts…Not all bishops have been so critical. Bishop Bartholomew I of Constantinople has repeatedly called for a mosque to be built in Athens.

Still, the issue of a mosque has become a rallying point for xenophobic groups in the country such as Golden Dawn, a now-banned political party whose members tried to firebomb a Bangladeshi mosque in the city, stabbed to death a Pakistani immigrant and led several violent protests over the years against the Votanikos district mosque project. The new state-funded mosque will not meet all the needs of the large Muslim community in Athens. But, said Malik, it would be “an important step towards making us feel like we belong here.”

Source: Religious News Service (RNS)

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