Statement About Tyre Nichols

Bilawal hamdu lillah wa salatu salam ala Rasulillah in the name of Allah to compassionate, the Most Merciful. All praise is due to Allah and may his peace and blessings be upon our beloved prophet muhammad sallallahu alayhi wa sallam, I begin by greeting you all Assalamu alaykum Warahmatullahi Wabarakatuh just attempting to answer a question that's been going on around social media nowadays, I'm not on social media, but it was just brought to my attention regarding Tyree Nichols and whether Tyree Nichols took shahada Masjid salaam or not. So remember that Monsieur de salaam, I am the Imam of Masjid Salaam. By the way, the way that we like to do things is that when people come to take

their shahada, we like for them to take their shahada publicly. And the reason we like for people to take their shahada publicly is because we want to celebrate this is a really, really important event. And we want this to be a communal celebration. In addition to that, we also identify this individual, this brother or sister as a community member, so that they receive their rights, and that we have an obligation towards them, be burial beats, support, whatever the case is, we want to identify this individual as a community member. And that takes place when this happens publicly. Please remember, making your shahada public is not a requirement to validate your Islam, you don't

need to you do not need your shahada to be done in front of a chef, you do not need to have it in front of an Imam, you don't need to do it in front of a masjid, you don't need to do it with the congregation, you can actually make your own shahada private, and that is 100%. Acceptable.

So we will make sure that this is clear. We also want to acknowledge the challenges that some of our brothers and sisters who go through, you know when they convert to Islam, you know, sometimes people become Muslims, and they just don't want that information to be public. Either. They are not ready for it yet. They have familial issues that are taking place. I have had many people who came to me and said, Look, I became a Muslim. And I did not tell my parents for an entire year, I did not know how my mom is going through the app. My mother is very religiously active. My dad is active in the church. And we just want to make sure that you know, I can tell my parents this information. And

somehow I am able to control the reaction or at least predict the reaction. 100% agree that many people take their shahada, but they do not necessarily come out publicly to indicate that they are that they are Muslims. So what happened in the case of Tyree Nichols, I gave the hotbar, the same Friday that the video was going to be released. I speak to the community to speak about against police brutality, we speak against oppression and all this whole base over a brother comes to me and tells me that he believes that tidy Nichols is a Muslim because the brother has given him a Shahada. So I have the light, you know, so what happens and I met a brother three years ago, in some event,

you know, the Muslims were praying outside tidy nickels seemed like he was interested according to this brother, and he was listening to what was going on. It was the Friday fatwa. Afterwards, you know Tyree started walking away. The brother called him and said brothers, salaam alaikum. I don't know if he greeted him with a Salam Alikum but whether you know, we're glad to have you what's going on, spoke to him, gave him a business card. Fast forward. The brother tells us that July of 2022 he believes that tidy Nichols came to Mercy the salam and took shahada atmosphere to Salah brother also reminded me that I personally was given the hotbar that they admitted to the salam. But I was not

available when tidy. Nichols took the shahada, the brother was the only one present with few other brothers when tidy. Nichols took the Shahada. Now admittedly, the salaam when people come in and take the shahada publicly, we usually record our hotbars. And if somebody is taking the shahada, the hotbar is the audio recording is extended to also include in it the person taking a Shahada. Does this happen every single time? No, it only happens when the shahada is scheduled. Many times we may have a shahada that is scheduled but the person ended up showing up late or coming in late. Many times. We have had people who come in after Juma is over as people are leaving, we are all standing

in the multipurpose hall. And the person walks in and says this is my friend, he wants to take shahada right there and then in the multipurpose room, we huddle people in you know, brothers sisters, you know, come in, you know, such and such person has taken the shahada, we celebrate their shahada, we embrace them and we and we hug them. We do not have any such record of this happening at Masjid salaam I'm talking about we do not have any video recording of this happening at Masjid

Should Salam. So what happens is, procedurally speaking, mostly the Salaam is unable to confirm this information. But also because of the report of this brother, we are unable to deny this information. And the way that this information now, the way that the story is being told around social media, is that the leadership ethnicity Salaam is suppressing this information. And I say, Man, this is this is really sad, because every time we brought up the issue of diary Nichols, I reminded the community I say, Look, we have a report that tells us that brother, tidy, Nichols has taken the shahada, if that is the case, Alhamdulillah here, but may Allah subhana, Allah bless his soul and may Allah

Subhana Allah, you reunite us with him in the highest place of paradise, Europa Alameen. Remember when we made this statement, we are neither confirming nor are we denying? The point here is not to deny somebody Islam or rubella. Why would we do that? I think that we would all be extremely happy. If we find out that it Nichols died a Muslim 100 liable Alameen. If that is the case, while law you we would all be happy if that is if that is the case. So what happened?

People who have heard this story initially, they pointed out to some discrepancies into the story. I personally spoke to the brother, a beautiful brother who said that, you know, it's given him the shahada, a brother is a pioneer in the community has been very active in the Darrow scene for 40 years. I said to the brother said, Brother, if you give Ty the shahada, why did we not fight for his legal Islamic rights? You know, what about a Muslim burial? Why did we not make that you know, part of part of what is going on? And brother said, look, he said, you know, the political situation was so charged, and we did not or the brother felt that he did not want to disturb what was happening by

bringing in another disturbing element into the scene. So he said, I just I just I just held back Hamdulillah we also have a community member here in our midst, brother Surrey, who worked with Tyree Nichols at Verizon for about three years sorry, met with tidy nickels three days before being him you know, killed by the by the police or beat to death by the by the police. Tyree Nichols is aware of brother Solomon, so sorry, is a Muslim. They have had many conversations about Islam. Three days prior to him being beat to death by the police said he called Tyree nickels to catch up and they had coffee together. And they spoke about many things, and tidy did not bring up him converting to

Islam. Two brothers sorry. Is that enough to deny the person their deal their Islam? Absolutely not. Maybe he forgot. Maybe the opportunity never presented itself? Maybe he was still not comfortable going public with that information? Is this the basis as to why we are unable to confirm? Absolutely not. But this is part of the greater story that is taking place out there.

And then also, what we said is, if if somebody makes such a claim, you know, in sha Allah, it never happens to any of us if the case is that we outlive our children and our child passes away. And somebody you know, makes a claim a local pastor or local rabbi, they make a claim that this person came to our church, we baptize them or they accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. As a parent, I'll be very livid and I'll say What proof do you have for making for making this statement? And if we do not, if they do not have a proof, there was a wiry spreading rumors about my about my child. So procedurally speaking, Mr. De Salam is unable to confirm such information. What we also

cannot deny it on the basis that we have a brother who said, I believe that I gave this person a shahada Alhamdulillah on a personal level, I choose to believe this brother procedurally as an institution, it would be very difficult for me to make such a to make such a claim. So that is what happened. But the idea that we are suppressing information, denying information, intentionally withholding information, I'm sorry, but I think that's just silly. And like I said, the sad part is people claiming that they have

Personally confirmed with Masuda Salam, I am the Imam of mercy, the Salah, I have not received a single call, not a single call, not a single individual ever called to confirm with me.

They call the masjid, maybe they spoke to our office manager. And our position has been cleared, brothers we are unable to deny, nor are we able to confirm that report. This is a case that has received a lot of attention, national international attention. And if the institution is going to make such a statement, we better have some very solid proof. Even the brother who gave him the shahada did not feel that you know what it was, it was,

it was proper for him to go out there and fight for, you know, for the, for the burial, or for the rights of Tyrion Nichols as a,

as a Muslim. Please remember that we are not attempting to take away Islam from Brother Nichols or anybody or anybody else.

And a point before last that I want to make is, and this is beat at Mr. De Salam. And I hope that this is the case everywhere else. When people come in and identify as Muslims, we do not, and we should not inquire into the validity of their Islam.

People get very offended when you do that. And it's a really, really sensitive topic for our brothers and sisters convert specially in the African American community. When somebody you know, this idea of just questioning their Deen questioning their Islam. It's not it doesn't feel good, you know, and I sometimes you know, we are unable to, to, to relate to this as an immigrant community, I still be able to imagine that every time somebody meets us at Are you a citizen? What proof do you have? Are you here legally? What proof do you have? People would get offended by these types of questions when other people also, you know, why don't you just take my word at face value? If I say

I'm a Muslim, then that's all we need. That that is all we need to say that, you know, to say that somebody is a Muslim, our brother and sister is not only our brother and sister in humanity, but also our brother and sister in in faith. The last point is that our community was interested in the case. Not because Tyree, Nichols was a Muslim, we're interested in the case because what happened to him is wrong, regardless of what he believed or did not believe. And I believe that as a community, let's make sure that we don't care about these things only when it's when these things happen to people like us, but also when it happens to people who are not like us. We do not care for peace and

justice only for the people that we like, but also we care for peace and justice for people that we may not like or they may not like they may not like us, because justice is an absolute virtue, meaning that how we feel is irrelevant to the fact that we want justice to be carried to be carried out. So again, the point here is not to deny Brother Nichols dying a Muslim, procedural speaking once again, this is where do we stand as a masjid? I hope this is a clarification and I know that this is going to raise more questions than give answers but nevertheless, it may answer some of the questions out there. Does that matter hair salon Malika