Groups of fasting men fingered prayer beads as they reclined against its yellow brick walls, while women watched their children run and laugh in the mosque square.
Armoured vehicles, flanked by soldiers with automatic weapons, sit outside mosques, public squares and amusement parks, partly the consequence of deadly ethnic riots in 2009 that claimed about 200 lives.
The explosions — devastating car bombs and roadside blasts — struck the huge Shiite enclave of Sadr City, a Sunni mosque, public squares, a crowded restaurant in the north of Baghdad and middle-class shopping districts.
With three mosques in four square blocks, the Park Estate was ripe for revival.
After shopping in the souk we visited another mosque near the square that allows non-Muslims to enter — the Mosque of al-Azhar, which dates back to 970 A.D. Wearing headscarves provided at the entrance, we followed one of the custodians as he led us up some back stairs and onto the rooftop.
But the plan to build a large mosque in the square is, in the eyes of many analysts here, the real nub of the dispute.
But on Sunday, Mr. Erdogan struck a defiant chord, and while he said no shopping mall would be built in Taksim, he vowed to build another mosque in the square.
The Mass began late, and Mr. Arafat, seated in the congregation, was seen glancing at his watch as the time approached for midday prayers at the mosque on the square.
In the end, the guidelines formulated will be applied to develop Al Morsi Abul-Abbas Mosque Complex public square in Alexandria, to put emphasis on the place's identity.
The development plans envisage building a replica Ottoman-era barracks and a mosque on the square, in a city already well-served by Islamic houses of prayer, critics say.
