The last mosque built in Thessalonika in 1902 is also one of the city’s few Ottoman-era mosques to survive to the present. It was built by an Italian architect to serve the city’s Dönmeh, or ‘convert’ community. The Dönmeh were descendants of Jews who had converted to Islam in the 17th century. They were follows of Sabbatai Zevi, a Jewish mystic from Smyrna, who proclaimed himself the Messiah