New mosque plans for Athens

by Kathy Tzilivakis 
31 Jul 2011

ATHENS’ Muslim immigrants will soon have their own official place to pray - a former naval building in Eleonas. This is the latest twist in a long-running saga to establish the first mosque in Athens since Ottoman rule ended nearly 200 years ago. 

Details of the government’s latest plan for an official mosque in Athens were included in a last-minute amendment to a new environment bill discussed in parliament on July 27. However, it was quickly removed at the request of far-right Laos party MPs who argued the mosque has nothing to do with environmental issues. Environment Minister Yiorgos Papakonstantinou agreed - as “a show of good faith”, he said - and announced the mosque amendment would be included instead in an upcoming bill to regulate illegal construction.

All the while, the city’s estimated 120,000 Muslim immigrants currently have to squeeze into basements and other rented spaces, which members of this growing community have converted into makeshift mosques. There are more than 100 unofficial mosques scattered around the city, according to Naim El-Ghandour, chairman of the Muslim Association of Greece.  

“If we had an official mosque,” El-Ghandour said, “there would no longer be any need for all these underground places of worship.”

“Muslims - and I’m not just talking about immigrants, because there are also second- and third-generation immigrants, as well as Greeks, who are Muslim - feel like second-class citizens because of their religion,” he said. “Why should all these people be made to feel like this? I’m optimistic that things will now start to change. It is also very important for us to have an official imam [to lead prayers at the mosque].”

The imam, according to a 2006 law and the amendment, will be appointed by the education ministry. The mosque will be managed by a group of five Greek officials and two Muslim community representatives.

Once renovated, the old naval base will be able to accommodate some 500 worshippers at a time.

Arab ambassadors in Athens have been calling on Greece to build a proper mosque in the capital for more than 30 years. Athens is the only capital city of the EU-15 that does not have an official mosque. 

The current plans for a mosque in Eleonas, three metro stops west of Syntagma, are a long way away from a decision a decade ago to construct a multimillion-euro Islamic centre and mosque in Peania, a town about 20km north of downtown Athens, near the airport. It was to be entirely funded by King Fahd of Saudi Arabia. 

There will be no traditional dome or crescent-capped minaret - the familiar beacon known to Muslims everywhere. At least, not yet, said El-Ghandour, a naturalised Greek citizen who arrived in Athens some 38 years ago from Egypt. 

“This is only a temporary solution,” he said. “The government explained to us that the navy building [a 1,000 square metre warehouse] in Eleonas is just a temporary solution until an actual mosque is built. This is because it could take years. We will need at least two years to actually build it, and we’ll also need about two or three more years before that to fight any possible lawsuits against this project in the courts.”

El-Ghandour and other members of the local Muslim community are in support of the plan. Many of them have even volunteered their services to paint and renovate the warehouse. “We have painters, craftsmen and construction workers who would be more than willing to volunteer,” El-Ghandour said. “We’re waiting for the authorities to get back to us about it.” 

According to the amendment, the ministry of education and religious affairs will cover the cost.

Opposition

Apart from the anti-immigrant and far-right groups that have been quick to oppose any and every plan for a mosque in Athens, most political parties seem to be more or less in favour of a mosque in Athens. An exception is Laos, whose spokesperson Kostas Aivaliotis recently suggested that, rather than establishing mosques, Greece should find a way to send Muslims abroad to countries where mosques exist.

Greece is 97 percent Orthodox Christian but both ruling Pasok and main opposition New Democracy (ND) are in agreement about the need to have a mosque in the capital. 

ND had first proposed establishing a mosque in Eleonas back in 2006. But even before that, former ND leader and prime minister Konstantinos Mitsotakis had publicly defended the plans for the mosque. He had said that even a public debate on the matter would be inexcusable and expose the country to condemnation. “As people of the diaspora, we build Orthodox churches from Australia to America and even South America. and Korea,” Mitsotakis said in 2000.

July 2000 Parliament approves plans to build an Islamic centre and mosque in Peania, on the northeastern outskirts of the city, near the Athens international airport. 

June 2001 Ambassador Abdallah Abdallah of the Palestine diplomatic representation in Greece, the dean of Arab ambassadors in Athens, says King Fahd of Saudi Arabia will finance the building of the Peania mosque.

July 2002         In a report, Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights Alvaro Gil-Robles notes that “the secretary-general for religious affairs [Ioannis Konidaris], as well as Archbishop Christodoulos, assured [him] that they had no objection to the building of a mosque for Muslims established in the Athens district”. 

October 2002     Father Epifanios, Church of Greece spokesman, says that the church will oppose the creation of a mosque in the downtown area because the average Greek is not yet ready to accept a minaret in the city centre. 

April 2003    Asked why construction hasn’t begun in Peania, foreign ministry spokesman Panos Beglitis puts the blame on Arab ambassadors. “Six months have passed and, despite repeated calls by the Greek side to the head of the Arab negotiating team here in Athens, there has been no answer. The delay does not lie on the Greek side.” Foreign Minister George Papandreou renews the government’s pledge to build a mosque in time for the 2004 Olympic Games.

August 2003    Peania Mayor Paraskevas Papakostopoulos appeals to the Council of State - Greece’s highest administrative court - to block the building of the mosque in his town. 

September 2003  The Greek Orthodox Church comes out against the plan for a mosque in Peania. Archbishop Christodoulos conveys his disagreement in a letter to Foreign Minister Papandreou. He urges Papandreou to change the location of the planned mosque because he is concerned that its dome and a minaret will send the wrong message about Greece, a Christian country, to visitors landing at the airport. Foreign ministry spokesman Panos Beglitis says the government has not and will not back down. “We remain firm on our position regarding the establishment of the mosque in Peania,” he notes. Papandreou tells The Guardian that the mosque will be built “in the spirit of multicultural, democratic Europe, of which Greece is a part”. He says that “the necessity of a mosque is even greater because Athens’ Muslim population has got that much bigger”. 

April 2004     Ambassador Panayiotis Makris, the foreign ministry official overseeing the planned mosque, says the newly-elected New Democracy government is determined to push through with the construction of the mosque.  

July 2004       Foreign ministry spokesman George Koumoutsakos says the mosque project is in “the final stage now and only bureaucratic procedures are outstanding”. 

October 2004   Makris says new legislation concerning the Peania mosque will be discussed in parliament in coming days. He says it is a top priority. 

March 2006      In a report, Gil-Robles expresses his dissatisfaction over the fact that Muslims in Athens are forced to “meet in secret in places unsuitable for prayer”. 

April 2006     Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyannis is reportedly against the plan to build a mosque in Peania and says she prefers it be situated closer to the downtown area. Greece’s powerful Orthodox Church says it will not oppose efforts to build a mosque in Athens, dropping past concerns. 

May 2006         As many as 10,000 local immigrant Muslims sign a petition demanding the establishment of a mosque in Athens. Representatives of the Muslim Association of Greece meet with the education ministry’s special secretary Athanasios Kyriazis to discuss the matter.  The parliament approves several amendments to existing legislation, allowing non-Orthodox religious groups to build their places of worship without having to first obtain approval from the Church of Greece. 

December 2010    Prime Minister George Papandreou announces in parliament that procedures for the construction of a mosque in the greater Athens region have been accelerated because the right to a place of worship is fundamental and adds that broad consensus has been achieved on the issue.

January 2011   Education and Religion Minister Anna Diamantopoulou tells parliament the mosque in Athens will be smaller in size than initially planned. She said the construction design will “respect the national framework and culture”.

Athens News 30/Nov/1999 page 10

New mosque plans | Athens News

My Comment:

Europe is going broke bailing out Greece, and Greece is spending its money on…mosques.

What economic crisis? Greek government spending $15 million to build mosque in Athens.

And no one, of course, will vet what is taught there. To do so would be “Islamophobic.”

Reminds one of the old saying that Nero fiddles while Rome burns!

If Muslims want a place of worship in Athens, let them build their own. After all, I have never heard of Saudi Arabia paying for any Christian Church in Mecca!!! Has anyone?