Focused mosque, muslim community emotion

« It’s sad, this is the third time that the mosque has suffered damage, » said spokesman for the Association of Muslim Worship of the Messaoud Settati Mosque. We came around 1 o’clock in the night from Saturday to Sunday with the imam who was parked in the compound and we did not notice anything, it was during the first dawn prayer of the day at 5 o’clock that we saw the red inscriptions ». A prayer that gathered a hundred people. For him, it could be likened to the acts of one and the same person who invariably uses red paint, even if the inscriptions change. A man young, tall, with a nonchalant gait, seen not this time, but the previous time by the cameras, quietly taking on leaving, after stepping over the gate, the direction of rue du Jourdain and the level crossing of the railway.

A caretaker on site?

The mosque punctuated by the five prayers of the day is closed between each gathering of the faithful by an electric gate day and night and the site is monitored by cameras.

As Mohamed Nayma, the new imam since October 2021, stipulates: « We are now thinking about the presence of a volunteer guardian ». For the religious guide, the star can evoke a pentagram in relation to a satanic sect, a track like any other, or a drift of extremism. All, faithful as members of the association, wonder about the symbolism of this star and the smiley discovered at dawn.

« We deplore these degradations on the wall of the mosque, a building which is usually respected by believers and non-believers. This house of God is sacred, we take off our shoes and we perform ablutions. It is a place of purity, purification. The first dawn prayer on the morning of the events was experienced with a form of anguish, especially in the light of the events reported by the media which targeted Muslims such as in New Zealand. These degradations intervene in the days following the end of Ramadan and the feast of Eid-el-Fitr, which is a moment of fervor and joy for our community. Especially since the mosque of Agen is attached to the notion of secularism, advocates tolerance through the inter-religious committee, and fight against the confusion between Islam and Islamism ». Mohamed Nayma tweeted on his account: « A mosque that advocates the values ​​of the Republic and participates in living together is unfortunately often targeted by this type of degradation. The Muslim community of Agen is sorry for these repetitive, disrespectful and uncivil acts » .

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Reactions condemning these acts targeting the mosque

« The mosque of Agen was the subject, on the night of May 7 to 8, of degradation by tags.

The prefect strongly condemns

these degradations and heinous acts committed against the mosque of Agen, in total contradiction with the values ​​of the Republic and the freedom of worship », reacted by press release the prefecture of Lot-et-Garonne.

« Anger when I learn that the mosque of Agen is again the target of degradations. I send all my support to the Muslim community and I strongly condemn this new racist act », writes Thomas Portes, president of the ‘Observatory against the extreme right and future candidate of the new popular union.

« I would like to condemn in the strongest possible terms the damage to which the Agen mosque was subjected on the night of May 7 to 8. The Agen mosque has been subject to damage several times in the past and , if the judicial inquiry will have to determine the motivations for these degradations, I regret that very often the Muslim religion is erected as a scapegoat, a receptacle for the anger and injustices which unfortunately strike our society hard and which some try to seize by playing on fears and amalgams. By protecting the free exercise of worship respectful of secularism, it is our Republic that we are defending », declared Sophie Borderie, president of the departmental council.

On the side of the investigation, nothing new at this stage.