Locals said anti-Muslim and racist slogans as well as a swastika were seen scribbled on the walls of Suleymaniye Mosque in the town of Dormagen, situated more than 560 kilometers (347 miles) southwest of the capital, Berlin, on Sunday. Turkey’s Dusseldorf Consul General Alaattin Temür visited the mosque following the sacrilegious attack, and was briefed by the mosque officials on the issue.
The mosque had earlier come under attack on December 22, 2014. The Suleymaniye Mosque reportedly covers 11,500 square meters, and incorporates a place of prayer, a conference room as well as a space for social activities. Some 3.5 million euros (4.14 million US dollars) is needed for the project to be accomplished. On Saturday, tens of thousands of people marched in Germany’s eastern city of Dresden to call for more tolerance and to protest hatred and racism emerging in the German society.
The marchers outnumbered the 18,000 people who had gathered in the city on January 5 in an anti-Islamic rally organized by the extremist so-called Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the Occident (PEGIDA).
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has lashed out at PEGIDA and its followers, calling them proponents of “racism and hatred.” She has urged all Germans to stigmatize the group by not participating in its rallies.
Other German officials, including Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier and President Joachim Gauck, have also called on Germans to turn away from the group.
Press TV