Omar Suleiman – How can Muslim communities advocate for Black issues

			So, you know, I think practicing Islam in this sense, right. So,
		

			you know, there's a lot of talk in this kind of work around ally ship, forming allegiances and
serving as allies. While that can be useful, I think was a more pertinent discussion is advocacy.
Right? How can massage it? Because I mean, it's not just that mosques have a credibility issue with
non Muslims. You can go into some massages across America and particular communities, and they look
like geriatric centers. This is it's that massage it and Islamic institutions are losing their
relevance even for Muslims, in some cases, right? People are not finding comfort going there. I was
raised, I was born Muslim. I was raised Muslim, and I go into semesters and I don't feel the the
		

			embrace and the cultural and not even cultural just like kindness, man. I mean, like, like, Am I
welcomed here or not? And that that is I think, that comes across in several ways. First of all,
just the interaction, the personal interaction, how one is treated? What are the topics of the hood?
But do I see myself in in the curriculum of them? Okay, what are the issues that are talked about in
those announcements? And what issues are you taking up? I didn't see many Muslims out there for
falando Castillo when he got killed less than a mile from here and there, I think three or four
massages in this area. There were a couple of Muslims around, but I didn't see any mosque taking
		

			that up. Right. And so how are you? So so it's a question of relevance. So for example, Muslims with
this Muslim ban, okay, jump up, and they want the Latinos, blacks and all of these communities to
come and jump on board and support them with that. Are you they're not you cuz I've seen you. But
are they is the community there? When this border wall hops up? Is the community there when there's
police violence help? So there's a community there? Where's the community stance on affirmative
action? What's the community stance on black underemployment and a booming economy? Right. And so I
haven't seen any of the massage take these issues so that the master the institutional agendas need
		

			to reflect that that's I think, and I think that's lost on a lot of people. Oh, yes. That's really
lost on it. Like they don't you know, it's like, okay, we need to we'll send some people to the
protests, like, I don't care if you come in exactly. sighs my voice in the mosque, you put a table
up, you put me you put one brother who came out of the nation, and you put a moderator and you come
in your exotic voice and then you say check, Black History Month? That's exactly, absolutely, yes.
You know, I'm saying, Let me get my needs to be met. Well, how can my needs be met in advocacy, not
Elijah, but advocacy with the Muslim community. Right. Right. So you know, for example, ice as I
		

			told you, I work in schools has come to literally the boundaries. And when parents say, okay, baby,
have a nice day at school and drop their kids off.
		

			Ice comes up and arrest of parents, almost all school grounds. What has the Muslim said about that?
		

			Have you heard sanctuary Muslim Sanctuary Movement, you have 700 plus churches and synagogues how
many sanctuary mosques are there in the country? I was gonna ask you that because that
		

			is heartbreaking.