- More than 2,000 mourners honor the murdered men by defending the mosque.
- The FBI is investigating the attack as a suspected hate crime.
- Mourners call for an end to anti-Muslim hatred.
SAN DIEGO: More than 2,000 people gathered in a San Diego park Thursday to mourn the killing of a security guard and two other men as they tried to stop this week’s attack on the city’s largest mosque.
Men and women, including uniformed police officers, lined up for the funeral prayer, or Janazah, to remember the three men whom mourners referred to as heroes for delaying and distracting the attackers, preventing further bloodshed at a time when children were at the mosque school.
The bodies of the men, Amin Abdullah, 51, Mansour Kaziha, 78, and Nadir Awad, 57, lay under cloth and rugs, under a white canopy.
“[Allahu Akbar] God is the “greatest,” mourners chanted in Arabic, raising their hands at the service in a park located between the city’s river and a soccer stadium.
The three men would be buried side by side later that day in a nearby cemetery.
“Today is a message for everyone. Our community was hurt, but our community remains strong and steadfast,” said the center’s imam, Taha Hassane, adding that people had traveled from the eastern United States and through California for the service.
The FBI is investigating the attack as a suspected hate crime, and the killings have unnerved Muslims across the United States at a time of rising Islamophobia.
Mourner Ruba Abu Jamah, who knew the three men, called for an end to the hatred towards Muslims she said inspired the attackers. He questioned why the mother of one of the teenage suspects, who alerted police that her son was suicidal, allegedly allowed him access to weapons.
“For the love of God, why are we turning back? Hatred makes us turn back,” said Abu Jamah, after hearses took away the men’s bodies for burial. “Moms, don’t go on a full gun display if you know your 16-year-old is depressed.”
Abdullah was shot and killed in a shootout with the teenage attackers during which he used his radio to request a lockdown procedure, police said.
Kaziha, the center’s maintenance man and cook, as well as Awad, whose wife is a teacher at the center and who lived across the street from the mosque, were shot dead by the attackers after they heard gunshots and ran toward the center.
Abdullah’s actions are blamed for delaying the attackers’ entry into the center, where 140 students hid in closets and other spaces, police said.
The attackers fled the mosque in their vehicle and were later found dead in the vehicle from self-inflicted gunshots, police said.
Khaled Abdullah, 24, the security guard’s son, said his family has been strengthened by the way his father died.
“The fact that he was on the front lines, trying to defend children and innocent people, makes me feel good,” Khaled said. Reuters On Wednesday. “Calling him a hero is the least we can do.”
