Bodo Ramelow slowly gets to his knees as the screaming starts again. "You should be ashamed", it roars from the speakers across the street, "you ignorant and fool over there!" The left-wing politician does not react, deliberately placing a red brick on a painted rectangle.
A strikingly sunny November day in a conspicuously bleak industrial park in the north of Erfurt. In the suburb of Marbach, the Thuringian Prime Minister lays the foundation stone for a mosque - for a very special one: for the first time, a Muslim church is being rebuilt in one of the new federal states.
The resistance is huge. The administrative court in Weimar had decided that the opponents of the construction project on this day may demonstrate directly in front of the property - with loudspeaker trucks, with banners, with great attention.
It's about a lot, for everyone involved. Some, the Muslims of the Ahmadiyya community, after years of planning finally want to leave behind the turmoil and resistance. The others, including groups called "Erfurt faces" and "Pax Europe", want to continue their resistance after years of protest.
If the plan of the one rises, Thuringia's first new mosque will be built within a year - with prayer rooms, an apartment for the imam, a lit glass dome and an eight-meter-high minaret. If the plan of the others works out, these plans will remain plans for as long as possible.
Fear for the West
While the Islam enemies, guarded by a dozen policemen, indulge in brusque and bold theses, the Muslims celebrate this special day with a rather unobtrusive, quiet celebration. One might think that some people are exercising their right to freedom of expression and others their right to freedom of religion.
If only it were that easy. The first new construction of a mosque in one of the new federal states is considered by the mosque opponents as a beacon of a supposed invasion of Islam. If you believe them, the West is in danger in the Marbach industrial estate.
It is unclear, however, how Erfurt should be Islamized just from this barren patch of earth. Even normal community work reaches its limits here: The site is located in a commercial area in the northwestern no man's land of the state capital, halfway between the university campus and the remote Marbach.
Soon a muezzin would call to his faithful, his reputation would probably reach only to the nearby garage or the danger center on the other side of the street. It would therefore be the least citizens ever heard of the community life. Apart from that, no muezzin will call here: the minaret is merely an ornament and a mere symbol.
But the fear of the opponents of Islam is real. In the past, the protest was correspondingly tasteless: sometimes some of them set up large wooden crosses next to the building plot, sometimes a skewered pig's head with blood and paws. On one occasion, veiled demonstrators marched through the district, and another time a right-wing extremist staged a mock execution in the style of Islamist terrorists downtown.
DPA
Other Erfurt sites between the mosque site and the opponents of Islam
Probably, to stay away from such scenes halfway, the actual ceremony takes place in a marquee, out of sight of the demonstrators. The mayor has arrived, representatives of all parliamentary factions except the AfD, emissaries of the major Christian churches and the Jewish community. The sheer number of prominent visitors is a signal to protesters across the street.
"The Basic Law applies to all"
Ramelow joins the microphone as one of the first. "I have nothing against freedom of expression," he says, "but I attach importance to the fact that the Basic Law applies to all of us." It is not about Islam. But about religious freedom.
Ramelov avoids mentioning political actors directly - but he is likely to think of the AfD under ultra-right chief of state Björn Höcke in much of what he says. The party interfered in the theme again and again and made mood against Islam. There were tumultuous town hall meetings and city council meetings, but in January the permit was issued for the 650,000-euro building - financed by donations.
This success story also highlights Abdullah Uwe Wagishauser, the federal chairman of the Ahmadiyya community. The Muslim group sees itself as a liberal reform movement within Islam, which probably has something to do with its history: In many Muslim countries, the faithful are being persecuted, many adherents fled all over the world - including Europe. In Germany, Ahmadiyya claims to have about 45,000 members, in Thuringia there are a few dozen.
Bass against hatred
Wagishauser, a type of retired English teacher, becomes political in his speech. He says he is proud of what he has achieved, "he likes the demagogues and the rabble-rousers or not." Mosque new buildings are "no land acquisition projects, as Mr. Höcke claims again and again". Wagishauser's voice is trembling now, as if all the stress of the past few years was resonating. It's just about it, he says, to build a worthy place to pray.
Wagishauser is outraged by "self-proclaimed Islam experts", a supposed "clash of civilizations" and a "hate spiral, which is flat against all dissidents." Even as he speaks, the other side gets louder outside. More and more frequently, entire sentences of the opponents of Islam in the marquee are to be understood. Such sentences: "Friends, we are the healthy!"
Then another group turns on the volume controls: Left demonstrators who have formed a kind of human shield in front of the mosque grounds with "Dear without hate" signs. Her motto: "Love breaks - religious freedom is law". The group has brought a music system and now insulates with loud basses the acoustic range of the other side.
It is not a productive dialogue. How should the faithful in the north of Erfurt and their new neighbors live together in the future, how great is the danger of further conflicts or an escalation of the situation? Wagishauser is confident that everywhere in the past Ahmadiyya mosques have arisen, there has been a peaceful coexistence after some time.
One will probably still hope for that.