In Berlin, inside a Gulen “light-house”

Fethullah Gulen is an Islamic scholar, preacher and social advocate.
Fethullah Gulen is an Islamic scholar, preacher and social advocate.


Date posted: December 16, 2016

Naomi Conrad

Turkey has detained thousands with alleged links to the Gulen movement – a religious network that spans the globe. Students often live in shared flats, so-called lighthouses. Naomi Conrad gained access to one of them.

Talk to Germans of Turkish descent and many recall childhood friends who gravitated towards religious conservatism and, having donned headscarves and more modest customs, slowly and quietly drifted away. “Gulen”, they say, and shrug.

They’re referring to the religious movement of the US-based Turkish Sunni cleric Fetullah Gulen, built around the notion of Hizmet, or “service”, which runs hundreds of educational establishments across the world, spanning from Afghanistan to Tanzania and the United States.


Kristina Dohrn, a cheerful, outgoing anthropologist, who has been studying the movement for almost ten years in Germany and Africa, pauses for a second when asked to characterize the movement: “It’s a global, conservative network with a strong focus on education.” And yet, Dohrn is convinced that there is no grand master plan to take over and Islamize the world: “At the most, there’s a shared vision of an ‘ideal’ society, but it’s one that remains vague.”


It’s a secretive movement which originated in Turkey, whose structures remain largely opaque and who members are unwilling to profess their adherence to Gulen. This has resulted in criticism that the movement lacks transparency and has an agenda of indoctrination and Islamization through its network of schools and free tuition centres.

In Germany, the movement was long a darling of politicians, given its focus on free education among the German-Turkish community, nurturing bright students and helping them access higher education and high-level jobs.

Expert: no grand master plan

But in recent years, it has received more scrutiny, not least after its long-time alley, Turkish President Recep Erdogan, publicly split with the group, accusing it of infiltrating state institutions and even outright “terrorism”.

Germany’s intelligence services disagree: In 2014, they published an assessment outlining that while some elements within the movement gave room for concern, such as statements made by Gulen which “conflicted with core principles of the democratic order”, they didn’t warrant an observation of the movement.

Kristina Dohrn, a cheerful, outgoing anthropologist, who has been studying the movement for almost ten years in Germany and Africa, pauses for a second when asked to characterize the movement: “It’s a global, conservative network with a strong focus on education”, she finally says. “But you could also call it a kind of work ethic.”

Members, who meet in weekly prayer sessions and study the teachings of Gulen, are expected to “find jobs which are good for the community” – and for many that means serving the wider community through education: Many become teachers, and are sent to the movement’s many schools and free tuition centres across the globe, “which are supposed to raise the religious elites of tomorrow, which are then expected to move into positions of power.”

And yet, Dohrn is convinced that there is no grand master plan to take over and Islamize the world: “At the most, there’s a shared vision of an ‘ideal’ society, but it’s one that remains vague.”

Inside a light-house

The group’s elites of tomorrow, the bright students who are expected to work hard and progress into important positions in society, often live in so-called “light-houses”, shared flats, strictly separated by gender and financially supported by the Gulen movement.

In the past, the Gulen movement was wary of giving media access to such flats, which host weekly seminars and study meetings. But today, thousands of its members – both actual and suspected – are being rounded up and imprisoned in Turkey among accusations that they were conspiring to take over the country in a failed coup attempt earlier this year.

As the conflict quickly spread outside Turkey, dividing the Turkish community in Germany into camps supporting either Erdogan or Gulen, DW has been finally allowed access to one of the five light-houses in Berlin, which houses female students.

Outside the nondescript block of flats in central Berlin, a family of five scurried home, as the boom of a premature New Year’s Eve firecrackers reverberated through the narrow street.  Inside the tidy flat, a polite, eloquent young woman with a light-blue headscarf and long tunic, who DW agreed to call Özlem, made a pot of ginger tea, while on the table a tiny Christmas carrousel of angels and shepherds danced around a flickering candle.

Split in Turkish community

Özlem is a Gulen supporter who defies the conspiracy theories surrounding the group. She is a young, educated woman with a degree in linguistics who plans to work in educational policy. She also doesn’t shy from criticizing the movement she joined when she was fourteen, after an uncle introduced her mother to the movement. Men rather than women, she conceded, often held important positions, and she was quick to condemn the anti-Semitic remarks Gulen made in his earlier writings.

When she moved to Berlin from a small town in rural Bavaria, joining a lighthouse seemed a logical step for Özlem. She calls the five women who share immaculate rooms, books and copies of the Quoran neatly stacked on desks, as well as daily prayer meetings, her “surrogate family”.

She is, she says, a conservative Muslim, who prays five times a day and is opposed to sex before marriage.

But some of her views, she concedes, may clash with those of the wider movement and indeed other light-houses, particularly more conservative Turkish leaders: Gay marriage, for Özlem, who says that many of her friends are atheists and Jews, is a good thing, and politics and religions should be separated.

No one, she said, had ever instructed her to take on a certain profession or join a political party.

As a flatmate wandered in to the small kitchen to make dinner, Özlem shook her head. Life, she said, had become difficult for Gulen supporters in Germany. Some mosques have banned known Gulen supporters, labeling them “traitors” and many of her friends now attend mosques in neighbourhoods where no one knows about their secret affiliation.

But worst of all, the rift has spilt into her family, too: “My father’s not religious, and he told us to leave that ‘terrorist network’.” Özlem and her four siblings refused and, after several heated rows, the family reached a shaky truce: “At home, we simply don’t talk about Gulen and politics any more.”

But, she said, her father still jokes that his children are “terrorists”. She shrugged.

Source: Deutsche Welle , December 16, 2016


Related News

Gulen suspect testifies before US Congress on recent coup attempt

An alleged member of the Fetullah Gulen organization was invited on Wednesday to speak to a congressional panel on Turkey, a stunning move that could exacerbate tensions between Ankara and Washington. Ahmet Sait Yayla was added to the original list of speakers to address the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Europe, Eurasia and Emerging Threats.

Formerly Gülen-linked schools in Albania face growing gov’t pressure

Several schools formerly run by the Gülen movement in Albania have been the subject of growing government pressure in recent weeks. On Oct. 28 the campus of the Turgut Özal School was raided by Albanian police without any court order or warrant, and excessive force was used in the presence of students.

WSJ: Turks fleeing Erdogan fuel new influx of refugees to Greece

Around 14,000 people crossed the Evros frontier from January through September of this year according to the Greek police. Around half of them were Turkish citizens. Many are judges, military personnel, civil servants or business people who have fallen under Turkish authorities’ suspicion, had their passports canceled and chosen an illegal route out.

3 dead, 5 missing in attempt to escape Turkey’s post-coup crackdown

At least three people died and five others were missing after a boat carrying a group of eight capsized on Tuesday in the Maritsa River while seeking to escape a post-coup crackdown in Turkey.

Three ministers resign as one urges PM to step down amid corruption probe

Environment and Urban Planning Minister Erdoğan Bayraktar, in a harsh statement, claimed that he had been pressured to submit his own resignation to save the prestige of the government, adding that the prime minister should also quit as most of the amendments on construction plans mentioned in the corruption investigation were made on Erdoğan’s orders.

Foreign students express bewilderment over gov’t bid to close Turkish schools

Foreign students who are graduates of schools opened by Turkish entrepreneurs affiliated with the Hizmet movement all around the world, have expressed bewilderment over the government’s plan to shut down the schools, saying that the Turkish government is making a grave mistake in targeting these schools as they are renowned and praised for their high-quality education by foreigners.

Latest News

Fethullah Gulen – man of education, peace and dialogue – passes away

Fethullah Gülen’s Condolence Message for South African Human Rights Defender Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Hizmet Movement Declares Core Values with Unified Voice

Ankara systematically tortures supporters of Gülen movement, Kurds, Turkey Tribunal rapporteurs say

Erdogan possessed by Pharaoh, Herod, Hitler spirits?

Devious Use of International Organizations to Persecute Dissidents Abroad: The Erdogan Case

A “Controlled Coup”: Erdogan’s Contribution to the Autocrats’ Playbook

Why is Turkey’s Erdogan persecuting the Gulen movement?

Purge-victim man sent back to prison over Gulen links despite stage 4 cancer diagnosis

In Case You Missed It

Dialogue and Friendship Dinner Unites Multi-Cultural, Faith Groups

‘Kimse Yok Mu’ helps in Peru

Globalization and the Hizmet movement

Fethullah Gulen – man of education, peace and dialogue – passes away

This is too much! [About the Lies and Slanders directed to Gulen movement]

Gülen conference in London

Gülen Movement’s role on London conference agenda

Copyright 2025 Hizmet News