7 News Belize

How Do Muslims Feel About Orlando Mass Murder?
posted (June 14, 2016)
The massacre in Orlando is the worst mass shooting in US history, and that spells trouble for Muslims worldwide, since the killer Omar Mateen, professed to be a Muslim.

Now, the Muslim community is observing Ramadan this month. It is the holiest event in the Islamic Calendar - when Muslims fast and pray five times per day.

And in the middle of this prayerful time, comes the something as vile and horrific as the Orlando mass murder. Today we spoke to Naveed Mangla, a leader of one of the Muslim communities in Belize, who gave us their response to this latest incident.

Naveed Mangla, President, Ahamadiyya Muslim Community
"First of all our community the Omnity Summad condemn the task that happened and we say that this has nothing to do with Islam. Islam as you know, is 25% of the World's population, so you cannot have one bad egg or very few people doing something bad in the name of Islam. Islam is a religion in which the Holy Quran which is our review of the book, says that if you kill on person unjustly, its as if you have killed all of mankind. If you give life to one person its as if you have given life to all mankind. With this beautiful teaching how can anybody even think of taking a life from an individual and say that he's a Muslim, he's not a Muslim."

Reporter
"Do you guys continue to receive backlash because of these people that profess to be of the Islamic faith and go out and do these evil acts?"

Naveed Mangla, President, Ahamadiyya Muslim Community
"Like I mentioned at the beginning, we were having a little bit of trouble here, but by the grace of God, now Americans and even Belizeans are mature enough to distinguish that these people are not a true Muslims. At the beginning it was tough here too that whenever attack would happen, somebody would come up as if we had something to do with it. Slowly people realized that not all Muslims are like that."

There are between one to two thousand practicing Muslims in Belize.

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