Indonesia boosts Christmas security over potential terror threat

Yahoo – AFP, December 17, 2019

Despite being a Muslim-majority nation, many Indonesians are happy to take part
in Christmas festivities regardless of their religion -- although conservative Islamic
groups frequently target public displays (AFP Photo/ADEK BERRY)

Jakarta (AFP) - Muslim-majority Indonesia will deploy nearly 200,000 security personnel nationwide ahead of Christmas to guard against potential terror attacks, police said Tuesday.

The Southeast Asian archipelago of 260 million has significant numbers of Christians, Hindus and Buddhists who have been targeted by radical Islamist groups.

On Tuesday, authorities said some 192,000 police and military personnel would be deployed to secure Christmas and New Year's Eve celebrations across the country -- including in easternmost Papua, a predominantly Christian region.

The deployment, which comes after a recent spate of attacks, is more than the 167,000 personnel deployed last year.

"As many as 10,000 personnel will be deployed in Jakarta" alone, said National Police spokesman Argo Yuwono

"Based on intelligence data, there are potential risks... so we're taking preventive measures but we are also ready to take proactive action," he added.

Many past attacks in Indonesia, which has dozens of groups loyal to Islamic State's violent ideology, have been against police and other state symbols.

Authorities routinely arrest suspected IS-linked militants ahead of alleged planned attacks.

In October Indonesian President Joko Widodo ordered beefed-up security after two militants from an IS-linked terror group stabbed his chief security minister. He survived the assassination attempt.

Last month a suicide bomber blew himself up at a police station in Sumatra, killing himself and wounding six civilians.

Hundreds of suspects were rounded up after the attacks, which came more than a year after a suicide bomber family killed a dozen congregants in attacks at churches in Indonesia's second-biggest city, Surabaya.

On Tuesday the country's new chief security minister Mahfud said high security was also meant to ensure Christian communities could celebrate Christmas without being targeted by groups keen to disrupt the festivities.

"We need to anticipate as early as possible things like intolerant incidents and burning down houses of worship," the minister, who goes by one name, told reporters.

Conservative Muslim groups frequently raid shopping malls and other public places to protest against Christmas displays or seasonal attire worn by Muslim employees.

Indonesia's halal tourism bid faces pig pushback

Yahoo – AFP, Albert Ivan Damanik, with Haeril Halim in Jakarta, October 31, 2019

Contestants in a pig-catching competition show off their prize in Muara,
Indonesia (AFP Photo/Albert Ivan Damanik)

Indonesia's bid to lure more visitors by spreading halal tourism across the archipelago is facing a backlash, with a Christian celebration of pigs -- forbidden for Muslims -- the latest act of dissent.

The weekend festival-cum-protest in Sumatra, featuring pig racing, chubbiest hog contests and a porcine fashion show, comes as holiday hotspot Bali pushes back against rolling out more Muslim-friendly services on the Hindu island.

Critics say a government plan to cash in on halal tourism -- part of a broader campaign to replicate Bali's success nationwide -- is another threat to minority rights in the world's most populous Muslim-majority nation.

And critics have warned that the sprawling nation of 260 million -- where nearly 90 percent of the population follows Islam -- is taking hard-right turn with a conservative cleric now installed as vice-president and hardliners growing increasingly vocal in public life.

Indonesia's reputation for tolerant Islam has been under fire for years.

Pushing halal tourism in areas with religious minorities -- including Christians, Buddhists and Hindus -- may do more harm than good, warned Ali Munhanif, an expert on political Islam at Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University Jakarta.

Indonesian children gather around a caged pig at the Lake Toba 

Festival in Muara, on Sumatra island (AFP Photo/Albert Ivan Damanik)

"The phenomenon signals an effort to institutionalise conservatism," he said.

"Bali successfully manages its tourism sector without using a 'Hindu' label.

But advocates say halal tourism is misunderstood.

"There is a public misperception that halal tourism is Islamisation. That is wrong and it's why some people overreact to the concept," said Zainut Tauhid, Indonesia's deputy minister of religious affairs.

"It is about providing necessary facilities for Muslim visitors such as prayer rooms. So it is facilitation rather than Islamisation."

'Divide people'

That view isn't shared by some around Lake Toba, a scenic crater lake in Sumatra where the weekend pig festival was held.

Indonesian children take part in a pig-themed colouring contest (AFP Photo/

Albert Ivan Damanik)

Most locals are Batak, a Christian ethnic group that puts pigs at the centre of its traditional cuisine, with hog farming a key source of income.

Last month, provincial governor Edy Rahmayadi raised eyebrows when said he wanted to boost tourism with Islam-friendly facilities and services.

That included opening more halal restaurants and mosques, as well as banning the public slaughter of hogs, with the governor saying the practice could turn off Muslim visitors.

"This idea to bring in halal tourism is going to divide people," festival organiser Togu Simorangkir told AFP

"It's a step back for tourism here," he added.

About 1,000 people dropped by the event, including children who scribbled in pig-themed colouring books and adults watching as hogs were judged on their plump proportions.

"Batak culture is particularly known for its pigs," said higher schooler Edo Sianturi.

A blindfolded boy takes part in a pig-catching competition during a 

festival in Muara (AFP Photo/Albert Ivan Damanik)

"We've been raising them and earning a living from them for generations."

Visitor Sabrina Singarimbun, a Muslim student in a head-covering hijab, was keen to see which best-dressed pig would win the festival's fashion contest.

"I disagree with the (halal tourism) idea because it's Batak culture here and most people aren't Muslim," she said.

'Tourism is about happiness'

Elsewhere, halal tourism is often seen as a lucrative business opportunity.

Thailand and Taiwan are among regional destinations tapping the halal tourism sector, which a 2017 study found will be worth some $300 billion annually.

This month, Indonesia ushered in new halal labelling rules for consumer products and services, as the government eyes travellers from other Islamic nations to rev up its much-touted "10 New Balis" tourism push, which includes Lake Toba.

But efforts to cater to Muslim visitors has drawn controversy.

A farmer splashes water over pigs in their pen during the Pig and Pork Lake 

Toba Festival in Muara (AFP Photo/Albert Ivan Damanik)

This summer, officials in Lombok -- an island next to Bali that has many Muslim-friendly services -- quickly rolled back plans to set up separate camping areas for male and female hikers in Mount Rinjani National Park after a public backlash.

Two restaurants in Makassar on Sulawesi island, meanwhile, were forced to close after a Muslim group in July complained that the smell of their pork dishes was wafting over to nearby mosques and halal restaurants.

Back in North Sumatra, the governor's spokesman Muhammad Ikhsan said his boss was misunderstood.

"He just wants to make Lake Toba a friendly place for Muslim visitors," Ikhsan said, adding that he hoped it would also curtail the environmental impact of pig farming.

"What we want is just to make things organised, not to make it a halal place."

Death toll mounts as Papua hit by bloody unrest

Yahoo – AFP, September 24, 2019

Torched shops and cars line a street in Wamena in Indonesia's Papua province
after deadly rioting (AFP Photo/Vina Rumbewas)

Wamena (Indonesia) (AFP) - More than two dozen people have died in riots in Papua, authorities said Tuesday, sparking calls for an investigation into one of the bloodiest eruptions of violence to hit the restive Indonesian territory in years.

Thousands fled to shelters following an outburst of bloodshed that saw civilians burned alive in buildings set ablaze by protesters, with at least 30 people killed and dozens injured since Monday.

Papua, on the western half of New Guinea island, has been paralysed after weeks of protests fuelled by anger over racism, as well as fresh calls for self-rule in the impoverished territory.

"This is one of the bloodiest days in the past 20 years in Papua," said Usman Hamid, Amnesty International Indonesia's executive director.

"Indonesian authorities must initiate a prompt, impartial, independent and effective investigation," he added.

Some 26 people died in Wamena city where hundreds demonstrated and burned down a government office and other buildings on Monday, authorities said, as images showed burnt-out buildings and charred cars overturned on rubbish-strewn streets.

"Some were burned, some were hacked to death... some were trapped in fires," local military commander Chandra Dianto told AFP.

Most victims were non-Papuans, authorities said, threatening an escalation in violence against migrants from other parts of the Southeast Asian archipelago.

A soldier and three civilians also died in the provincial capital Jayapura, where security forces and stone-throwing protesters clashed Monday.

The soldier was stabbed to death and three students died from rubber bullet wounds, authorities said, without elaborating.

Some 700 people had been rounded up for questioning, with several hundred later released.

'Mostly migrants'

Some 4,000 residents, including mothers and their children and the elderly, sought shelter at military and police posts, government buildings and a local church. Most were migrants.

A destroyed police truck in Wamena, Papua province, after deadly riots in 

Indonesia (AFP Photo/Vina Rumbewas)

"There are local Papuans who helped protect migrants by hiding them in their homes, but when word got out their houses were also targeted," said Yudi, an Indonesian businessman living in Wamena, whose wife left Tuesday for security reasons.

"Wamena is destroyed," he added.

The majority of Papuans are Christian and ethnic Melanesian with few cultural ties to the rest of Muslim-majority Indonesia. Most previous clashes have been between separatists and security forces.

One analyst threw cold water on the idea that migrants may have been targeted in the fires.

"I doubt... that this was intentional, or at least planned," Damien Kingsbury, a professor of international politics at Australia's Deakin University.

Wamena resident Naftali Pawika said renewed violence was driving a wedge between neighbours.

"This conflict is splitting migrants and indigenous Papuans apart," said the 37-year-old Papuan.

Monday's protests in Wamena -- mostly involving high-schoolers -- were reportedly sparked by racist comments made by a teacher, but police have disputed that account as a hoax.

The United Liberation Movement for West Papua described Monday's violence as a "massacre" and said that 17 Papuan high school students had been gunned down by Indonesian security forces.

Neither the military nor the separatist movement's claims could be independently verified.

Conflicting accounts are common in Papua and the government appears to have renewed a region-wide Internet service shutdown.

Jakarta has said the riots were meant to draw attention to Papuan independence at this week's UN General Assembly.

A low-level separatist insurgency has simmered for decades in the former Dutch colony after Jakarta took over the mineral-rich region in the 1960s. A US-sponsored vote to stay within the archipelago was widely viewed as rigged.

Weeks of protests broke out across Papua and in other parts of Indonesia after the mid-August arrest and tear-gassing of dozens of Papuan students, who were also racially abused, in the country's second-biggest city, Surabaya.

Jews live in the shadows in Muslim-majority Indonesia

Yahoo – AFP, Peter Brieger in Jakarta and Ronny Buol in Tondano, 5 March 2019

Most members of the tiny Jewish community in Muslim-majority Indonesia
keep their identity under wraps

Yaakov Baruch is the rabbi at Indonesia's only synagogue but he keeps his religious identity under wraps, like most of the tiny Jewish community living in the world's biggest Muslim-majority nation.

A group of men threatened Baruch with death and called him a "crazy Jew" as he walked in a mall with his pregnant wife several years ago, prompting him to limit when he wears his kippah -- a Jewish skullcap.

"It's never happened again because I chose to hide my identity as a Jew in public," he said.

There is a similar ripple of concern among many of the estimated 200 Jews living in the Southeast Asian country of 260 million people, with most centred in a remote corner of the sprawling archipelago.

Manado on Sulawesi island is one of the few places that Indonesia's remaining Jews -- mostly descendants of traders from Europe and Iraq who were once thought to number around several thousand before World War II -- feel comfortable showing their faith.

A 62-foot-tall menorah, possibly the world's largest, stands near the town of Tondano -- around 20 kilometres (13 miles) south of Manado -- where Baruch holds regular services at a modest, red-roofed synagogue.

Indonesia's remaining Jews are mostly descendents of traders from Europe and

Iraq who were once thought to number around several thousand before World War II

'The enemy'

The Shaar Hasyamayim synagogue is Indonesia's lone house of worship for Jews after the only other one in the city of Surabaya was demolished in 2013.

It had been the site of anti-Israel protests for years, and was sealed off by religious hardliners in 2009 and left to decay.

Indonesia has long been praised for its moderate brand of Islam, but more conservative forms of the religion have taken centre stage in recent years, driven by increasingly vocal hardline groups.

Tensions in the Middle East, particularly between Israel and the Palestinians, spill over here and deepen religious divides.

Thousands of hardliners demonstrated in Jakarta when US President Donald Trump announced last year that the American embassy in Israel would be moved to the contested city of Jerusalem.

"There is still a lot of anti-semitic sentiment in Indonesia," Baruch said.

"Generally speaking, Indonesians don't differentiate between being Jewish and Israel. They think Jews and Israel are the enemy of their religion and state," he added.

"There is no denying that tolerance is fading in our country."

The size of the Jewish community makes it almost invisible so Jews have not 

been the target of Islamist militants like some of Indonesia's larger religious minorities

The size of the Jewish community makes it almost invisible so Jews have not been the target of Islamist militants like some of Indonesia's larger religious minorities.

A wave of deadly suicide bombings at churches in Surabaya last year highlighted the threat to minority groups, while Shiites and Ahmadis -- regarded as heretics by some majority Sunni Muslims -- have also been the target of violence.

Kosher food shortage

Still, Indonesia's Jews are on the radar of some groups.

Monique Rijkers' efforts to bridge the divide with a TV programme about Judaism drew the ire of the Indonesian Muslim Students Association, which she claims reported her to government and broadcast regulators.

"They demanded that I be fired and that the programme be cancelled," said Rijkers, founder of Hadassah of Indonesia, a non-profit organisation that offers cultural education programmes centred on Israel, Jews and the Holocaust.

Indonesia's Jews face some practical challenges, too, such as finding kosher food in a country where it's not widely available.

Another hurdle is that Indonesia has long allowed for only six different religious categories on all-important ID cards -- Islam, Protestantism, Catholicism, Buddhism, Hinduism and Confucianism.

Indonesia's Jews face some practical challenges, too, such as finding kosher 

food in a country where it's not widely available

The cards are crucial for accessing government services, and for doing things such as registering marriages and births, meaning most Jews lie and put "Christianity" on the documents.

Even some Muslim Indonesians learn that taking an interest in anything Jewish can raise eyebrows.

Sapri Sale, who started teaching a Hebrew class in Jakarta a year ago, has been studying the language since the 1990s and compiled what he says is the world's first Hebrew-Indonesian dictionary.

But his interests got little positive feedback at home.

"I was called Sapri the Jew," he said.

Pacific's Cook Islands mulls new name

Yahoo – AFP, 5 March 2019

Dancers from the Cook Islands perform during a ceremony in the capital,
Avarua. The government is considering changing the name of the tiny nation to
something more traditional

The tiny Pacific nation of Cook Islands is considering changing its name to something that reflects its Polynesian culture, rather than honouring the British explorer James Cook.

The government set up a committee in January to find a new indigenous name for the grouping of 15 islands, about 3,000 kilometres (1,900 miles) northeast of New Zealand.

Initially the idea was to have the indigenous moniker feature alongside the existing Cook Islands name, in the same way that its larger neighbour is sometimes known as Aotearoa-New Zealand.

But committee chairman Danny Mataroa said Monday that once discussions began it became apparent there was support for dropping the Cook Islands name altogether in favour of one in the local language, known as Cook Islands Maori.

Map showing the Cook Islands

"When the committee members, which include Cook Islands historians and people with deep traditional knowledge, met we decided it was time we change the name of the country," he told AFP.

Mataroa said the new name should reflect the country's heritage, its people and its strong Christian belief.

Deputy Prime Minister Mark Brown backed the move, but said there was still a long way to go before the nation of 12,000 people changed its name.

"I'm quite happy to look at a traditional name for our country which more reflects the true Polynesian nature of our island nation," he told Radio New Zealand.

It is not the first time the issue has surfaced, with a 1994 referendum to change the name to Avaiki Nui resoundingly defeated.

Weightlifter Sam Pera parades the Cook Islands flag during the opening ceremony 

of the 2004 Olympic Games. The tiny Pacific Ocean nation is considering a name 

change to something more traditional

The Cook Islands were a British protectorate from 1888 until 1900, when they came under New Zealand's jurisdiction.

The Cooks gained independence in 1965 but maintains close ties to Wellington, which takes responsibility for the Cooks' external affairs and allows its citizens to live and work in New Zealand.

Twin bomb attacks on Philippine church kills at least 18

Yahoo – AFP, Nickee Butlangan, January 27, 2019

It is one of the deadliest bomb attacks to strike the southern Philippines in 

years (AFP Photo/NICKEE BUTLANGAN)

Jolo (Philippines) (AFP) - At least 18 people were killed Sunday when a double bomb attack hit a Catholic church on a southern Philippine island that is a stronghold of Islamist militants, the military said, days after voters backed expanded Muslim self-rule in the region.

In an attack claimed by the Islamic State group, a powerful first blast shattered pews, broke windows and left bodies strewn inside the cathedral in the Catholic-majority nation's restive south as mass was being celebrated.

Moments later a second explosion outside killed troops who were rushing to help the wounded in the smoking and heavily damaged church on Jolo, which is overwhelmingly Muslim.

It is one of the deadliest bomb attacks to strike the insurgency-plagued southern Philippines in years, and shows militants in the region are still a threat despite recent steps toward peace, experts said.

The bloodshed came less than a week after voters' decisive approval of giving Muslims in the south more control over their own affairs, which sparked hopes of quelling long-time separatist violence.

Manila swiftly vowed to hunt down the attackers, but no group has claimed the 

bombing (AFP Photo/NICKEE BUTLANGAN)

"Just because the (referendum) has passed does not mean that things are going to get better overnight," said Gregory Wyatt, director for business intelligence at PSA Philippines Consultancy.

"There are still militant groups that will continue to be active and pose a security threat," he told AFP.

Pope Francis, speaking in Panama, expressed his "strongest reprobation" for the violence. Once again, he said, "the Christian community has been plunged into mourning."

Bishop Angelito Lampon, who previously served in Jolo, said Sunday's attack may be the worst, but was certainly not the first on the church.

"In my 20 years there from 1998 to last week, there were seven hand grenades lobbed into our cathedral," he told AFP. "Fortunately there was just a little damage and no casualties."

IS group claim

The Islamic State group claimed responsibility for the attack, issuing a formal communique saying two suicide bombers had detonated explosive belts, according to the SITE Intelligence Group which monitors jihadist activities.

But a military report said the second bomb was left in the utility box of a motorcycle in the parking area outside the church.

Authorities said the notorious Abu Sayyaf kidnap-for-ransom group could be

behind the blasts (AFP Photo/NICKEE BUTLANGAN)

Manila swiftly vowed to hunt down the attackers.

"We will pursue to the ends of the earth the ruthless perpetrators behind this dastardly crime," presidential spokesman Salvador Panelo said in a statement. "The law will give them no mercy."

Five soldiers, a member of the coast guard and 12 civilians were among the dead while 83 other people were wounded, said regional military spokesman Lieutenant Colonel Gerry Besana.

The regional police chief Graciano Mijares put the toll slightly higher at 20 dead, lower than a figure of 27 he gave initially.

Pro-IS militants are among multiple armed networks based in the strife-torn region of Mindanao.

President Rodrigo Duterte put the southern Philippines under martial rule after pro-IS militants seized the southern city of Marawi in May 2017.

A bombing the previous year that ripped through a bustling night market in Duterte's hometown left 15 dead, and was blamed on the Maute gang of Islamist militants that pledged allegiance to IS.

The door, pews and glass windows of Mount Carmel Cathedral were blown off, 

military photos showed (AFP Photo/HANDOUT)

Before the IS jihadists' claim emerged, Besana said the notorious Abu Sayyaf kidnap-for-ransom group could be behind the blasts, but added officials were "not discounting the possibility that there are other perpetrators".

The remote island of Jolo is a base of the Abu Sayyaf, which is blamed for deadly bombings, including an attack on a ferry in Manila Bay in 2004 that claimed 116 lives in the country's deadliest terror assault.

'Peace must prevail'

Neither the hardline factions aligned with IS nor the Abu Sayyaf were part of the decades-long peace process with the nation's largest separatist group, Moro Islamic Liberation Front, that culminated January 21 with the resounding approval of a new Muslim led-region in the south.

Rebels and the government in Manila hope the new so-called Bangsamoro area will finally draw the investment needed to pull the region from the brutal poverty that makes it a hotspot for radical recruitment.

Despite Sulu province -- which includes Jolo -- voting against creating the new region, the area will still be part of the Bangsamoro.

The timing of Sunday's bombs raised questions on whether the attack was meant to derail the peace process.

National Security Adviser Hermogenes Esperon said "extremist criminals" plotted the bombings.

"We will not allow them to spoil the preference of the people for peace," Esperon said. "Peace must prevail over war."

Tiny Indonesian church prays for tsunami victims on Christmas day

Yahoo – AFP, December 25, 2018

Carita was one of the worst-hit areas (AFP Photo/ADEK BERRY)

A few dozen congregants gathered at a little church just outside Indonesia's tsunami disaster zone on Christmas day to pray for the victims of the deadly disaster.

Anita Sitorus led a sombre service at the Rahmat Carita Pentecostal church near one of the worst-hit areas on the western edge of Java island.

"After this incident, God let us continue to serve the people, and especially this is a chance to serve you God better," church head Sitorus said, a large cross on the wall behind her.

"To serve our brothers and sisters better, to do something for this area for the people who were victims of the tsunami.

"This is the time to say that you God are present in Carita," she added. "You are in Carita, your church is in Pandeglang (regency), in this tiny town."

Indonesia is a Muslim majority nation but it has a Christian minority, with services held Tuesday nationwide to celebrate Christmas -- and pray for those affected by the deadly tsunami.

"This Christmas is different because we're celebrating it during a disaster," Rahmat Carita congregant Eliza told AFP.

"For me, it's a chance to contemplate. God's love is real, we must not forget that."

The powerful tsunami struck Saturday night and without warning, sweeping over popular beaches on southern Sumatra and the western edge of Java and inundating tourist hotels and coastal settlements.

More than 400 people have been killed and thousands more have been displaced, with many left homeless after houses were flattened by the deadly wave.

Indonesian woman jailed for complaining about mosque noise

Yahoo – AFP, 21 August 2018

Loudspeakers used to call the faithful to prayer are pictured atop a tower at a
Jakarta mosque: a woman in Medan has landed in jail for complaining about the noise

A woman in Muslim-majority Indonesia was sentenced to 18 months in jail Tuesday for complaining about the volume of a mosque's call to prayer -- the latest conviction under a controversial blasphemy law.

Meiliana, 44, an ethnic Chinese Buddhist, was found guilty of insulting Islam for asking her neighbourhood mosque to lower its sound system because it was too loud and "hurt" her ears.

There are some 800,000 mosques across the archipelago, with the five-times-a-day call to prayer heard everywhere in the biggest cities and smallest towns.

Tuesday's verdict will likely fuel fears that Indonesia's moderate brand of Islam is coming under threat from increasingly influential radicals.

The court in the city of Medan on Sumatra island said the woman's comments two years ago triggered riots that saw angry Muslim mobs ransack Buddhist temples.

Some ethnic Chinese in the area fled in fear.

The defendant's lawyer said his client would appeal the decision while Amnesty International urged a higher court to quash the sentence.

"This ludicrous decision is a flagrant violation of freedom of expression," said its Indonesia executive director Usman Hamid in a statement.

"Sentencing someone to 18 months in prison for something so trivial is a stark illustration of the increasingly arbitrary and repressive application of the blasphemy law in the country."

Indonesia, which has the world's biggest Muslim population, is officially pluralist with six major religions recognised, including Hinduism, Christianity and Buddhism. Freedom of expression is supposed to be guaranteed by law.

But criticising religion -- particularly Islam, which is followed by nearly 90 percent of Indonesia's 260 million citizens -- can land offenders in jail.

Rights groups have long campaigned against the nation's blasphemy laws, which they say are frequently misused to target minorities.

Last year Jakarta's former governor -- the city's first Christian leader of Chinese descent -- was sentenced to two years in jail for blasphemy.

Vice President Jusuf Kalla made a plea in 2015 for places of worship to turn down the volume slightly to placate nearby residents.

Taboo-breaking liberal mosque opens in Berlin

Yahoo – AFP, Yannick PASQUET, June 17, 2017

Lawyer and women's rights activist Seyran Ates opened the
Ibn-Rushd-Goethe-Mosque with words of welcome before Christian and
Jewish guests and a large media contingent (AFP Photo/John MACDOUGALL)

Berlin (AFP) - With a mission to spread a liberal form of Islam, a mosque where men and women pray side by side has opened its doors in Berlin, complete with female imams.

The Arabic phrase "Allahu Akbar" ('God is greatest') resonated through the crowded Ibn-Rushd-Goethe-Mosque Friday as US-Malaysian Ani Zonneveld, one of the world's few female imams, launched the call to prayer.

Then one of the founders of the new place of worship, lawyer and women's rights activist Seyran Ates, opened the event with words of welcome before Christian and Jewish guests and a large media contingent.

"We want to send a signal against Islamic terror and the misuse of our religion," said Turkish-born Ates, 54, dressed in a long white robe. "We want to practise our religion together."

Ates -- no stranger to breaking taboos, having called for a "sexual revolution" in the Muslim world -- vowed she would not allow ultra-conservatives "to rob me of my right to be Muslim".

Kneeling on green carpets, the faithful -- men and women, side by side -- bowed to Mecca for the traditional prayer as the imam spoke in German.

Some of the women wore veils or head coverings, others did not.

'Depoliticise' Islam

The new mosque, the 88th in the German capital, is located in a rented room on the third floor of the Protestant Johanniskirche (St. John's Church) building.

Founded by Seyran Ates, the mosque aims to establish a humanistic, 

secular and liberal reading of Islam (AFP Photo/John MACDOUGALL)

All Muslims -- Sunni or Shia, Alawite or Sufi -- are welcome in the mosque named after one of Germany's greatest writers, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, and 12th century Islamic scholar Ibn Rushd, also known as Averroes.

The seven founding members said they want to open their prayer hall to all groups, including gays and lesbians.

"This mosque allows Muslims to define themselves in a new way," said co-founder and German Islam scholar Abdel-Hakim Ourghi.

He added that "we will try to depoliticise Islam", as the religion was being torn by rival political movements. "Because religion is a private matter."

Police stood guard outside the entrance of the building.

The founders said they had not received any threats or insults, but that they fully expected not everyone would be happy.

Time for change

Germany, with some four million Muslims, has been the target of jihadist attacks, the deadliest last December when a truck tore through a Berlin Christmas market crowd killing 12 people.

Seyran Ates -- who has campaigned against forced marriages,
domestic violence and so-called "honour killings" among Muslim
migrants -- said the project was eight years in the making (AFP
Photo/John MACDOUGALL)

The arrival of more than one million refugees, most from mainly Muslim countries, since 2015 has worsened the fears of some Germans.

Ates -- who has campaigned against forced marriages, domestic violence and so-called "honour killings" among Muslim migrants -- said the project was eight years in the making.

"Many left along the way," she said. "They told us it was dangerous, that they were afraid."

Elham Manea, a Swiss political scientist of Yemeni background, said the time had come for change, with other so-called liberal mosques having also opened in the United States, Britain and Switzerland.

The Berlin mosque, financed by private donations, is located in the Berlin district of Moabit, which has a large immigrant population.

It was in this neighbourhood that Tunisian Anis Amri, the Christmas market attacker, frequented a radical mosque that has since been closed.

Pakistani human rights activist Mukhtar Mai (C) receives a standing ovation
as she takes the stage following performance of the opera 'Thumbprint', at
the Roy and Edna Disney/Calarts Theater (REDCAT) in Los Angeles, on
June 16, 2017 (AFP Photo/Robyn Beck)

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Yassmine el Ksaihi poses in the prayer hall of the Polder Mosque in Amsterdam, 

Netherlands, Tuesday, March 2, 2010. Uniquely in the Netherlands, men and 

women pray together in her mosque, albeit segregated, with the women praying

 in the back of the prayer hall. Devotions and sermons are conducted mostly in

 Dutch rather than Arabic. And non-Muslims are welcome. Across Europe Muslims

 are seeking a formula that lets them be an inseparable part of their country while

 maintaining their loyalty to their faith and origin. (AP Photo/ Evert Elzinga)