Turks push to turn iconic Hagia Sophia back into a mosque

>Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesman Tanju Bilgic said in a strident retort on state television that the Greek government goes out of its way to thwart the practice of Islam in Greece.

>“Greece has not given permission for the construction of a mosque in its capital for years, permanently intervenes in the freedoms of religion of the Turkish minority of Western Thrace and mistakes being against Islam for being modern,” said Bilgic.

>Yalcin said Turkey, by contrast, is more open to letting Christians practice their religion. “Many churches have been functioning freely in Istanbul" ever since the city was captured by the Ottomans, he said.

>That doesn't satisfy Greeks who still feel bitter over the loss of Constantinople, once the heart of the Byzantine Empire, whose Greek-speaking citizens were among the most cosmopolitan in the world.

>Visiting the Hagia Sophia last year was the trip of a lifetime for Dimitra Anagnostopoulou, 59, a Greek bookseller. “I felt awe,” Anagnostopoulou said. “But I was a bit let down by the Arabic signs left there from the time Hagia Sophia was turned into a mosque.”

>Some Turks also worry about the campaign to convert the museum. “Turning Hagia Sophia into a mosque has always been a cause for many conservative Islamists,” said Istanbul Bilgi University anthropologist Erkan Saka.

>Historians note that such changes have occurred throughout history, as Christians have turned pagan temples and mosques into churches or for secular uses. “The same happens today in the West, when empty Christian cathedrals are sold as secular buildings,” said Sotiris Mitralexis, a philosophy professor at the City University of Istanbul.

>Yalcin said everyone can be satisfied by using the Hagia Sophia as both a mosque and a museum. “All of the mosques in Turkey are open to everybody,” he said. “We even recommend that the upper floor be used as a kind of museum as it is now with the display of historical works.”

I don't see what's wrong with setting aside a few of the many rooms in the place so they can kneel and pray. It's a muslim country after all, and like the article says, they Turks are more tolerant of other religions than the orthodox Christian Greeks.

>>115418

The reason why Orthodox Christians, especially the Balkan ones, aren't tolerant of muslims and the Turks/Ottomans in general is because of the history they have with it.

You can't really pretend the sentiment came out of nowhere or that it isn't justified. For all that they blather about being tolerant, I'm not seeing one of their bigger mosques being converted into an Orthodox Christian church.

>>115421
there have been transgressions on both sides. both sides have historical reasons to mistrust or be intolerant toward one another. clinging onto old sentiments like that will never go anywhere, just hold back societies, hold back future relations..

>>115435

>there have been transgressions on both sides

Oh yeah, I totally remember how the Bulgars, Serbs and Greeks invaded Ottoman lands and forcibly converted people or inflicted religion-based taxes on the populace.

>>115399
It's a church you dumb sand niggers just because you put your stupid music towers up around it doesn't change that Christians built it for God

>>115446
>christcucks criticizing anyone for stealing other religions' shit
how are those stolen pagan holidays treating you?

>>115446
I don't think Jesus or St. Paul would call them "sand niggers" either.

>>115446
They believe it is the same Lord.

>>115446
*built it for the same god who Muslims and Jews worship as well

>>115446
>getting buttblasted over something that happened over 500 years ago

>>115732
unlike you americans we have a long history so 500 years isnt too old. the americas werent even colonized back then.

>>115439
> I totally remember

And so it will be again when we launch the final crusade.

DEUS VULT

>>115779

Orthodox Christians never launched crusades.

>>115399
The Basilica of Sophia will never remove the turk smell and wash the turk filth away.
Does it matter?

The inhuman mudslime masses long ago destroyed greek land, greek lives, greek culture and greek monuments.
Europe should've banded long ago to wipe them out and take back rightful land instead of giving them money for rapefugees and taking in their trash.

>>115835

There was one chance in the 19th century when the Ottomans/Turkey could have been driven further back and Constantinople retaken, but the British and the French sided with the Ottomans because they didn't want the Russians gaining a foothold there.

>>115828
No, but they supported and encouraged them because a string of Emperors thought they could turn Catholic fanaticism into a tool to help them reclaim the Near Eastern parts of the Roman Empire.

When the Crusaders marched to Antioch, they did it fed on Byzantine grain, passing through Byzantine lands and beside Byzantine troops.

>>115828
The crusades were launched specifically to defend the Orthodox lands, they were a great buffer state.
The only reasons why they eventually became collateral damage was because A) Venice wanted a piece of the Mediterranean pie and B) constant calls to arms made the participating factions disdainful of the Byzantines.

>115399
It was turned into a mosque in the 15th century after the Ottoman Turks defeated the Greek emperor in Constantinople and renamed the city Istanbul.

Why do people blatantly lie like that. It was renamed istanbul in the 1920s to separate turkey from it's past.

>>115919

Yeah, I don't understand why they think Haga Sophia has anything to do with Turk ancestors and why is it a symbol of their freedom, when it's literally something they took over from someone else when they conquered the city.

I imagine their history books have a lot of revision in them.

>>115919
>to separate turkey from it's past
Why do people blatantly lie like that?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Names_of_Istanbul#.C4.B0stanbul

>>116155
My bad. I don't know why they changed the name. But it's the equivalent of philadelphia changing its name to philly.

>>115399
> Relic of their ancestors
> Doesn't want a museum
I guess there are only so many pest control devices to be displayed. Greece should make an Arminian genocide exhibit.

I'd honestly rather see it flattened down to the the foundation than see it become a mosque again. All the people in this thread talking about Byzantine transgressions seem like they're reaching really hard for anything to shift the blame to "both sides," bullshit when the pogroms that ethnically cleansed Turkey of major Greek and Armenian minorities happened less than a hundred years ago.

If you're not a Muslim get the fuck out of Turkey

>>116641
Turkey for turkeys

>>116650
Wow. Apologize.

>>116653

I'm sorry you're a t*rk.

As a Muslim I don't think I agree. It's better served as a museum.

>>116641
If you're not Greek get the fuck out of Anatolia

>>116650
NOT SO FAST
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Afro_Turks

WE WUZ

>>115399
DEUS VULT!

This new global wave of nationalism feels especially insipid and tasteless. At least in the 1900s it felt new and exciting. Now it feels like we'r retreating into our shells when instead automation, genetic engineering, nanotechnology, AI, nuclear power, and space programs should be revolutionizing human civilization.
I think it's because this time around, there are no new ideas. Just a general sense that we need to regress because the unwashed masses are feeling insecure.

So long as they don't demolish anything it'll be fine
The only people who care about this are muzzies and crusader LARPers anyways

>>116989

>muslims not destroying sites of other religions

Good luck with that.

They're alreading LARPing that Haga Sophia has something to do with Turkey's freedom, what makes you think they'll let anyone remember in a decade or two that it was ever Christian to begin with?

>>115439
You just described the 19th century in general.

>>117065

No, I didn't.

>>116972
That utopia didn't have room for people who disagreed with the noxious accepted politics and instead of confronting the uncomfortable questions that started popping up when the situation started to look more grim than positive for them the powers that be buried their worries or told them they were terrible people for having them to begin with.

The initiative was surrendered to extremists who were willing to have those uncomfortable conversations about things like immigration or cultural stability and now they monopolize it for that reason. Telling people they have to surrender their history, culture, and livelihood within a generation or two is not acceptable to anyone with a working sense of self-preservation, so they went with the most obvious answer they could find.

>>117087
>Telling people they have to surrender their history, culture, and livelihood within a generation

You are deluded. The only people actually being told this are immigrants who are told they must be assimilated to be acceptable.

>>117089
Assimilation is the only way immigration works. You can't have two parallel societies and cultures within one country without causing civil, ethnic, class, religious, and regional strife.

>>117089

That's the way immigration works though, if you don't want the native population to be replaced.

You can't come into another culture and country and expect them to adapt to you.

>>115881
The Byzantines were sacked repeatedly by Crusaders, though.

>>117091
>>117092

> Telling people they have to surrender their history, culture, and livelihood within a generation

You like this then? A good thing?

>>117091
I know man.
Canada is literally hell with French fighting the English.
Switzerland is like a war zone of constant French-German-Italian genocide.

>>117092
>That's the way immigration works though, if you don't want the native population to be replaced.

I'm not sure how adding some extra people somehow 'replaces' the ones already there.

Take Britain for example. We have expected millions of foreigners but our native population is the largest it's ever been.

>>117125

If you go to another country, that's not your place of origin, then yes.

If you don't like it, feel free to fuck off.

>>117164
>If you don't like it, feel free to fuck off.

That would mean I would have have to emigrate.

When I do, do you think I should assimilate or preserve my own culture in a foreign country.

>>117166

Assimilate.

>>117167

Where should I go?

Native Brit currently living in Britain btw.

>Probably being told to fuck off by stupid a UKIP little Englander.

>>117168

What the hell are you talking about then if you're a native?

And no, I'm not from the UK or anywhere near it.

>>117406

Where you from?

>>115435
>there have been transgressions on both sides

yeah, small vs. huge. do you really want to pretend that you think both sides are equally at fault for what went down in the Balkans?

>>117125
>Telling people they have to surrender their history, culture, and livelihood within a generation

we are talking about immigrants. they absolutely do have to ditch their 'culture' in return for a livelihood, yes.

>>117442
This is what is like to see.

I bit of civic nationalism.

It doesn't matter if your white, black or brown as long as you're red, white and blue.

>>117410

Balkans.

>>117127
It wasn't long ago there were terrorist groups in Canada striving for Quebec's independence. The only reason it didn't escalate is because Canada bends over backwards to accommodate French Canada.

Switzerland is its own culture with a very strict national identity. They're very careful with who they let in and are not afraid to kick you out if you don't adhere to that standard. Pick better examples next time.

>>117125
That's how immigration works. Assuming assimilation will occur is the only reason immigration is tolerated in the first place. A large mass of people transplanting their society and injecting it into another without any hint of an attempt at assimilation into the host culture is not immigration, it's an invasion.

>>117128
Low native birth rates + high rates of immigration + high birth rates among the migrants. It doesn't take long for replacement to start happening in that context.

>>115418
Fuck you you piece of shit.What are you a fucking jew?

>>115399
They won that land by right of conquest so they should do what they want.

>>118220
I get the impression you're not universally consistent with that line of reasoning.

>>118222
I actually agree with him though

They won
Been there for almost a century
Still hold it

Turning a museum into a place of worship seems less worse than say turning a sacred ground into a casino

>>118235
Not really. Islam has very negative views of idolatry and when the Hagia Sophia was originally converted into a mosque the beautiful murals and paintings were all covered up or destroyed. Given Turkey's increasingly fundamentalist bent, there's no reason to think something similar won't happen again. As a museum it's already a place of worship for the past ingenuity of human engineering and a cosmopolitan symbol of one of the world's most endearing crossroads of culture and history. Turning it back into a mosque would be like converting the Pyramids into mosques after stripping them of their hieroglyphics.

Constantinople was also captured much more than a century ago. That anon was referring to right of conquest which would pertain to the Ottomans and Turkey is generally seen as the successor state to that empire. The people advocating for the mosque in the article even reference that, though they seem to be under some delusion the Turks built it altogether by themselves.

>>118220
>>118235

You've watched too much Game of Thrones.

I don't see why they shouldn't do with it as they please. As long as they can take the inevitable missiles leveling the building to ground, at least.

>>118343
What

>>115418
Give them an inch and they'll take a mile.