Summary
The largest Palestinian-dominated mosque, in the southwest Chicago suburb of Bridgeview, and the dominant organization within the suburban Palestinian enclave today (Palestinian Chicago — Identity in Exile, PDF p.35, p.60).
Details
- Friday prayer attendance shot from an average of 75 attendees in 1982, just after the mosque was built, to nearly 2,000 worshippers every week in 1994 (Cainkar 2004, as cited) (PDF p.35).
- Its construction in the late 1970s and early 1980s culminated earlier Muslim efforts, from 1950s banquet-hall and YMCA feasts onward, to build a mosque (PDF p.59-60).
- As a well-endowed organization it generates strong enclave solidarities and a new Islamic identity paralleling the Islamic revival in Palestine and the wider Middle East (PDF p.42).