ATHENS, Greece — On Eid al-Adha about 250 Muslims attended morning service in an underground mosque in Athens. A windowless basement with exposed ventilation shafts along the low ceiling, the al Salam Mosque is “underground” both literally and figuratively. While aesthetic carpets cover the floors, chips can be seen in the plaster walls. Many attendees were Greek, though there were also immigrants from Turkey, Pakistan, Egypt and some African nations.
“We have to pray in the garages,” Naim El Ghandour, president of the Muslim Association of Greece, told MintPress News. “This is not because of a lack of money but because they don’t give us the permission to have legal and open praying spaces.”
The last EU capital without a mosque
Al Salam is “unofficial,” unrecognized by the Greek authorities. The Greek government has approved an official mosque to be built multiple times in recent years but Athens remains the only European Union capital to lack a place for Muslims to properly worship — even despite estimates putting the Athens Muslim population somewhere between 200,000 to 300,000, a significant portion of the country’s 1 million Muslims.
“They make it very hard to be a Muslim,” said Elena Martine, a French resident of Athens who converted to Islam. “When you go in Europe, you can always find a mosque, you can find a place of worship for any kind of religion. But the government doesn’t want the Muslim people here. It’s as simple as that. They don’t accept us.”
Efforts to build a modern official mosque began in earnest decades ago but only gained enough support to see the Greek parliament approve it in 2000, then again in 2006 and 2011. However, appeals and delays have prevented it from being built, much of it the result of protest by various groups, including prominent members of the Greek Church.
Mint Press News Athens