A major event with a magnitude of 7.7 (Mw) located in Pazarc & imath;k district of Kahramanmara & scedil; on February 6, 2023. Approximately nine hours later, a second earthquake with a magnitude of 7.6 (Mw) located in the Elbistan region of Kahramanmara & scedil;, approximately 100 km from the first earthquake according to the Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency (AFAD). These two earthquakes and the subsequent aftershocks caused many deaths, destruction and severe damage in areas close to the East Anatolian Fault Zone. The seismological and structural observations applied in the Malatya, one of the provinces affected by earthquakes, are presented in this study. For this purpose, acceleration data recorded at the strong motion station located in Malatya province and operated by the AFAD were examined. The seismic stations located in the Kale, Do & gbreve;an & scedil;ehir, and Ak & ccedil;ada & gbreve; districts, located close to the province of the Malatya, were examined for the peak ground acceleration, the peak ground velocity, and the peak ground displacement for each station. Additionally, the spectral acceleration and the Arias intensities were calculated, also. The highest acceleration among these three stations in the Pazarc & imath;k earthquake was observed as approximately 0.16 g at station 4414 in the Kale district, and in the Elbistan earthquake, approximately 0.45 g at station 4406 in the Ak & ccedil;ada & gbreve; district. Since the accelerations of the main shocks were not recorded at the stations in the Malatya city center, both the peak ground acceleration and the spectral acceleration values were predicted by using the ground motion prediction equations (GMPEs). The largest ground accelerations were predicted between 0.15 and 0.2 g for the Pazarc & imath;k earthquake and 0.3-0.4 g for the Elbistan earthquake in the Malatya province, also by using GMPEs, for different soil types. The peak ground acceleration that can be produced by DD-2 (the earthquake with a probability of 10% of exceed in 50 years) earthquakes in the center of the Malatya, is 0.361 g according to the T & uuml;rkiye Building Earthquake Code 2018 (TBEC 2018). The Kahramanmara & scedil; earthquakes (Mw 7.7 and 7.6) caused heavy damage to the structures in Malatya center because they exceeded the maximum ground acceleration value that could be produced according to the 2018 T & uuml;rkiye Earthquake Hazard Maps (TEHM 2018). The results of the time-domain analysis applied to a collapsed building in the center of Malatya showed the necessity of obtaining site-specific earthquake spectra and making building designs and performance analyses by taking into account the structure-soil interaction. Taking these situations into consideration, it is expected that the building designs to be made based on the calculation of the largest spectrum acceleration values that may occur due to an earthquake in the worst ground conditions in the center of Malatya will be safer against earthquakes.

Many historical masonry mosques and minarets, including Milky Minaret Mosque and Ulu Mosque, which are very close to Ak Minaret Mosque in Malatya, suffered severe damage and collapsed after the Kahramanmaras, , earthquake on February 6, 2023. Despite the settled loose soil properties and the presence of a small stream flow near the mosque, Ak Minaret Mosque, a historical masonry mosque with a single dome and square, remains operational even after the aforementioned earthquakes. Additionally, DEMA's strong ground motion station was out of service during both earthquakes. This situation raises questions about the mosque's ability to withstand the seismic load. The basic purpose of this paper is to investigate in detail the seismic performance, damage limits, the reason for unexpectedly less damage due to the earthquakes, the potential failure mode, and possible resisted earthquake loads of the historical Ak Minaret Mosque in Malatya, T & uuml;rkiye. To achieve this goal, first, dynamic identification was performed on the mosque one year prior to the aforementioned earthquakes. Next, the material properties were determined using both non-destructive and destructive testing methods. Following the dynamic identification, a numerical model was generated by 3-D solid elements, and this 3-D model was calibrated using the dynamic identification tests. The mosque underwent both nonlinear static and nonlinear dynamic analyses. Nine seismic records were selected for the nonlinear dynamic analysis. Five of them were national, including even Kahramanmaras, , earthquake records, and three of them were selected from an international database on the basis of fault characteristics and site classification. The analysis results indicate that Ak Minaret Mosque incurred less damage than expected during the Kahramanmaras, , earthquakes. This could be due to soil improvement prior to the construction of Ak Minaret Mosque in 1573. Moreover, the effective restoration increased stiffness and maintained the mosque's stability. Finally, the possible resisted PGA by the mosque was around 0.22 g.