Peace Prayer Cancellation Stirs Controversy in Munich
The planned joint peace prayer event, set to take place at Marienplatz in Munich, has been abruptly cancelled. Munich's Lord Mayor, Dieter Reiter, cited the withdrawal of a representative from the Jewish community as the primary reason for the cancellation. Regretting the decision, Reiter acknowledged the timing may not be right for such a unifying event.
Shared prayers by Imam Benjamin Idriz and Rabbi Jan Guggenheim from the Jewish Community of Munich, as well as Protestant regional bishop Christian Kopp and the Catholic cathedral priest Monsignor Klaus Peter Franzl, were expected to occur during the ceremony. However, controversy surrounding the Muslim Council Munich's association with the German Muslim Society (DMG), a group believed to have links to the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood, raised objections.
The DMG, deemed as an opposition to the Federal Republic of Germany's democratic structure by the Office for the Protection of the Constitution, became a point of contention. The Green politician Volker Beck encouraged the cancellation of the prayer event, arguing that it served to trivialize Hamas and Islamism.
Muslim leaders expressed their disappointment at the event's cancellation. Imam Idriz, whose association Münchner Forum für Islam initiated the event, believed the intention was to acknowledge religious coexistence. Although Muslims wished to set a peace-promoting example, the cancellation left them feeling bitter.
Enrichment Insights:
While this article discusses a cancelled peace prayer event in Munich, the available sources do not provide specific details about the controversy surrounding it. Nonetheless, broader religious and political controversies can be observed in various contexts, such as BDS movement against Israel at Bowdoin College, allegations of Zionism during a U.S. Envoy meeting, and criticism faced by the AfD, a German far-right party, for their anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim rhetoric.
