House of Peace: A magnificently restored Ottoman mosque still serves the tiny Turkish community of Rhodes. I am not Moslem, yet even I find it peaceful and inviting.
House of War: This ramshackle "mosque" with cracking walls, shapeless features, shoddy exterior and a last-minute minaret made out of a steel pipe, serves only as a rude "retaliation" to the Hagia Triada in Taksim Square.Hardly any people go to pray in it, yet its loudspeakers are turned up so high that it hurts your ears to be around this mosque when the call to prayer is sounded. A sad reminder of how badly populism, politics and nationalism have corrupted this "religion of peace."
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