11-12-2007, 23:42
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חבר מתאריך: 08.11.02
הודעות: 32,894
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צרפת: עיריית Creteil בונה מסגד חדש ומפואר
CAIRO — While governments and citizens across Europe oppose minarets on their skylines, a French city is offering a rare example of accommodating its Muslims by helping build a mosque complex complete with a restaurant, bookstore, library, exhibition hall and study rooms.
"We wanted the mosque to be built where everyone could see it," Laurent Cathala, the mayor of Créteil commune in the southeastern suburbs of Paris, told the Washington Post on Sunday, December 9.
"We didn't want to hide it," added the Socialist Party member who can watch the construction from his 11th-floor office.
The nearly-finished building, with its 81-foot minaret and soaring dome, will accommodate more than 2,500 worshipers.
Costing $7.4 million, it stands on a knoll overlooking Créteil 's picturesque lake, the city hall and the police station.
With nearly $1.5 million help from the city council, the new mosque is coming complete with a cultural center -- the cafe, exhibition center, bathhouse, bookstore and study rooms.
It aims to meet the religious needs of Muslims who make up nearly 20 percent of Creteil's 88,000 population.
Cathala, who has been mayor for three decades, sees the mosque as part of the demographic evolution of the sprawling town of white high-rise apartments, glass office complexes and American-style, boxy suburban malls.
"If you're for social justice, you can't acknowledge part of the population and not acknowledge another part -- especially concerning their religion."
The city has long lacked a single stately mosque, leaving thousands of its Muslims praying in three tiny makeshift prayer halls -- none with a capacity of more than 200 people.
"This mosque is more than just an acknowledgment of our religion," believes Karim Benaissa, head of the Creteil Union of Muslim Associations.
"It's an acknowledgment of a city towards its citizens."
France is home to some 6-7 million Muslims, the biggest Muslim minority in Europe.
The Interior Ministry has identified 1,500 places of worship but only about 400 are stately mosques.
Most are temporary prayer halls in gymnasiums, unused shops or apartment house basements.
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