(THE OAK LAND PRESS) – Humanitarian Day reborn, Muslim activist celebrates Ramadan his way Last year, Ramadan ended just days before the murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, as the first wave of COVID-19 was beginning to intensify.
It was the beginning of a year when the burden and isolation of the pandemic left Black Muslim activists like Umar Hakim feeling depleted on the one hand, and targeted on the other.
“It’s 2021 and we’re still advocating for our freedom, like we’re not just as human as the next person,” said Hakim. “It makes me wonder, what’s the bigger truth? Why are we so targeted? Why do we need to be held down? Why do nobody want to share power?”
For Hakim, executive director of the Intellect Love Mercy Foundation, a Muslim organization that advocates for the homeless through community organizing and interfaith work in South Los Angeles, Ramadan 2021 couldn’t come fast enough.
For 10 years, Hakim has organized ILM’s Humanitarian Day, one of the country’s largest Muslim-led charity events. On a single weekend during the last 10 days of Ramadan, Hakim, 51, brings together nearly 800 volunteers and more than two dozen organizations to provide food, medical and dental services, and hygiene kits to an estimated 3,000 homeless people across Southern California, from Los Angeles’ Skid Row to Pomona and San Bernardino.
Last year, COVID-19 forced Hakim to move Humanitarian Day online. As the summer went on, a dozen other events, including “actions” for Floyd and two other victims of violence, Breonna Taylor and Ahmaud Arbery, went online as well.
Hakim, used to managing one of the biggest Black Muslim-led charity events in the nation, instead spent last Ramadan bottled up. “Ramadan for me is the chance to work, to bring people together, to organize,” said Hakim, from home on Zoom.
“I really believe that the good deed of it all is a blessing from Allah. And, (during) this time, I also get to show off my skills, my talents, my abilities.” Eid al-Fitr — the festival of breaking the fast, which ends the monthlong Ramadan holiday, begins the evening of May 13 this year.
