Pittsburgh shooting

Muslim communities raise thousands for Pittsburgh shooting victims

Within hours of the deadly attack Islamic groups set up online campaigns to support their Jewish neighbours

29 October 2018, 1:10 pm
Samina Mohamedali, left, and her husband Kutub Ganiwalla, members of the Dawoodi Bohra Muslim community, both of North Hills, prepare to place flowers on a memorial in front of the Tree of Life Congregation, Sunday, Oct. 28, 2018, in Squirrel Hill neighborhood of Pittsburgh. (Alexandra Wimley/Pittsburgh Post-Gazette via AP)

The Muslim community in America has been praised for its swift and generous fundraising response in the aftermath of the Pittsburgh shooting.

Within hours of the Saturday morning attack, two Muslim groups – CelebrateMercy and MPower Change – had set up online efforts under the hashtag #Muslims4Pittsburgh to raise money to help the families of the victims pay for things like funeral costs and medical bills.

They hit their $25,000 target in six hours, and this doubled to $50,000 less than 24 hours later. By Monday morning the total stood at an incredible $115,000.

The campaign was set up through the platform LaunchGood, a crowdfunding platform focused on the global Muslim community, and the two groups said they would transfer funds to the Islamic Center of Pittsburgh, which will then work with Tree of Life to send the funds to victims.

“The Muslim-American community extends its hands to help the shooting victims, whether it is the injured victims or the Jewish families who have lost loved ones,” they said. “We wish to respond to evil with good, as our faith instructs us, and send a powerful message of compassion through action.”

The main fundraising campaign, through the GoFundMe website, had raised more than $550,000 by Monday lunchtime, but it was the Muslim community’s efforts that drew attention, and the leaders of the Islamic Center of Pittsburgh got a standing ovation at the Pittsburgh vigil, as he told congregants about the fundraising efforts.

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