“It is important to share our pain,” said Sama Alibayari, a member of the Muslim Awareness Week board that organized the event. “It’s important to show that other people care.”
“It is important to share our pain,” said Sama Alibayari, a member of the Muslim Awareness Week board that organized the event. “It’s important to show that other people care.”
In 2017, a gunman entered the Quebec City Islamic Cultural Center after evening prayers and shot and killed six Muslim men.
Nineteen other worshipers were injured.
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It is something that, like Elibayari, has been seared into the memory of those gathered at the Montreal rally.
“We want the public to know that we always have this tragic incident in the back of our minds,” she told Global News, “every time we hear about something related to Islamophobia happening.”
Some fear it could happen again.
The Montreal commemoration rally was just one event on Sunday marking the second national day of remembrance for the Quebec City mosque attack and the crackdown against Islamophobia.
In Quebec City, for the first time, a memorial ceremony was held inside the prayer hall of the mosque where the shooting took place.
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, several cabinet ministers attended.
Those gathered at the Montreal rally stressed that although the mass murder happened six years ago, remembering it is one way to make sure it never happens again.
Ehab Latoyef, co-founder of Muslim Awareness Week, said, “Because if the problem in society is not resolved, if we do not become a better, more harmonious, more understanding society, it will happen again and again.” “If not us, then some other group.”
He and others pointed out that politicians have a responsibility to help.
Wearing an anti-Bill 21 button at the rally to protest the province’s religious neutrality law, Latoyeff highlighted Legault government policies that he believes work against reconciliation.
Some say Bill 21, which prohibits public servants from wearing religious garb, disproportionately targets Muslim women who wear the hijab.
“The way they normally set up ‘an us’ and ‘a them,'” he argued, “and leads people to believe that they belong to either ‘us’ or ‘them.’ Creates a rift between and from that rift, fear arises.
Despite the concerns, some at the Montreal rally said some things have changed in the six years since the shooting.
“We have a lot of groups now that are going to schools, organizations, to make sure we understand what Islamophobia is and what it is to be Muslim,” said Alia Hassan-Cornol, Montreal City Councillor.
The federal government has also appointed a special representative to combat Islamophobia.
Still, those in attendance caution against becoming complacent.
