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ISLAM

Muslim preschools ‘linked to Islamist groups’

A state-funded study into Islamic kindergartens in Vienna suggests that Islamist groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood and its Turkish counterpart Milli Gorus have links to some of the capital's preschools.

Published: 29 February 2016 13:05 CET
Muslim preschools 'linked to Islamist groups'
Sebastian Kurz (centre). Photo: Ministry for Integration, Europe and Foreign Affairs

Austria’s Integration Minister Sebastian Kurz (ÖVP) wants to introduce tighter controls on Islamic kindergartens to prevent radicalization and said he believed the study was necessary because there is a danger of “parallel societies emerging”.

The author of the study, Ednan Aslan, is a professor at the Institute of Islamic Studies at Vienna University. He found that the religious education preached by several of the capital's 150 Muslim establishments led to “theologically-motivated isolation” and robbed children of their autonomy through “intimidation”.

“Intellectual Salafists and political Islamists are the dominant groups in the Islamic kindergarten scene in Vienna,” the study concluded.

“In many of their publications the Muslim Brotherhood and Milli Gorus reject the Western way of life as an inferior worldview,” Aslan writes in the 178 page study.

He told the Standard newspaper that it was not acceptable that a representative of the Muslim Brotherhood, who runs a kindergarten in Vienna, should openly support the war in Syria or appear in a video in which he states that “we want to evangelize in Europe”.

Many of the private Islamic preschools are subsidized by the City of Vienna – to the tune of €30 million – according to a report in the Krone newspaper.

Aslan said that the majority of the Islamic kindergartens were unwilling to participate in his study and that some took down their websites to make some data inaccessible. Only 71 out of 150 Islamic kindergartens agreed to be part of the study.

The Krone quotes one integration expert who contributed to Aslan’s report as saying that it is as easy to open an Islamic kindergarten in Vienna as it is “to open a kebab shop”.

The study feeds into a wider debate about Muslim integration in Austria where the far-right Freedom Party (FPÖ) is leading the polls following the migrant crisis.

The FPÖ deputy mayor of Vienna, Johann Gudenus, has said that he wants to hold a special parliamentary session on the subject of Islamic kindergartens and a motion of no confidence against the head of the education board, Sonja Wehsely (SPÖ).

Gudenus added all kindergartens in the capital should be run by the City of Vienna, and not by private individuals or groups. The FPÖ also wants a financial audit of all monetary transfers to kindergarten operators and wants an investigation into whether any funds could have gone to finance terrorist groups.

The president of Vienna's Muslim community, Fuat Sanat, has said that allegations of “Salafist” education in preschools are “ridiculous”.

ISLAM

Mosques in Cologne to start broadcasting the call to prayer every Friday

The mayor of Cologne has announced a two-year pilot project that will allow mosques to broadcast the call to prayer on the Muslim day of rest each week.

Published: 11 October 2021 10:28 CEST
Mosques in Cologne to start broadcasting the call to prayer every Friday
The DITIP mosque in Cologne. Photo: dpa | Henning Kaiser

Mosques in the city of the banks of the Rhine will be allowed to call worshippers to prayer on Fridays for five minutes between midday and 3pm.

“Many residents of Cologne are Muslims. In my view it is a mark of respect to allow the muezzin’s call,” city mayor Henriette Reker wrote on Twitter.

In Muslim-majority countries, a muezzin calls worshippers to prayer five times a day to remind people that one of the daily prayers is about to take place.

Traditionally the muezzins would call out from the minaret of the mosque but these days the call is generally broadcast over loudspeakers.

Cologne’s pilot project would permit such broadcasts to coincide with the main weekly prayer, which takes place on a Friday afternoon.

Reker pointed out that Christian calls to prayer were already a central feature of a city famous for its medieval cathedral.

“Whoever arrives at Cologne central station is welcomed by the cathedral and the sound of its church bells,” she said.

Reker said that the call of a muezzin filling the skies alongside church bells “shows that diversity is both appreciated and enacted in Cologne”.

Mosques that are interested in taking part will have to conform to guidelines on sound volume that are set depending on where the building is situated. Local residents will also be informed beforehand.

The pilot project has come in for criticism from some quarters.

Bild journalist Daniel Kremer said that several of the mosques in Cologne were financed by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, “a man who opposes the liberal values of our democracy”, he said.

Kremer added that “it’s wrong to equate church bells with the call to prayer. The bells are a signal without words that also helps tell the time. But the muezzin calls out ‘Allah is great!’ and ‘I testify that there is no God but Allah.’ That is a big difference.”

Cologne is not the first city in North Rhine-Westphalia to allow mosques to broadcast the call to prayer.

In a region with a large Turkish immigrant community, mosques in Gelsenkirchen and Düren have been broadcasting the religious call since as long ago as the 1990s.

SEE ALSO: Imams ‘made in Germany’: country’s first Islamic training college opens its doors

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