You have not destroyed us:
Resilient community rejects hate
After losing her husband and son in the Christchurch terror attacks, Salwa Mohamad has a message for the shooter and those who think like him: you have not destroyed us.
‘‘To the person who did that, and to all people who are supporting him and have the same mind, if they think that they are destroying us, they are wrong,’’ Mohamad said yesterday.
‘‘What’s happened makes us stronger. Because we are not terrorists. People say that Islam is [a] terrorist religion, or Muslims are terrorists, and now the whole world saw who was the terrorist.’’
Mohamad spoke to media yesterday in a building near Christchurch Hospital, where her 13-year-old son, Zaid, was taken after being shot in the terror attacks that killed his father, Khaled Mustafa, 44, and, brother, Hamza, 16.
The Syrian family moved to New Zealand last year after living in Jordan. They expected to be safe here. On Wednesday, Khaled Mustafa and Hamza, a year 12 student at Cashmere High School, were laid to rest on New Zealand soil – the first victims of the attack to be buried.
Zaid attended the funerals in a wheelchair. He was with his mother speaking to media, surrounded by cameras with a blue blanket draped over his legs.
At times, his mother would lean over and grasp his hand, tightly. When someone told him his father was dead, Zaid said, he was sad. ‘‘When he tell me, I’m so sad.’’
‘‘I’m feeling like if I’m dead and my brother and my father is still alive, it would be better.’’
Zaid was at the Masjid Al Noor on Deans Ave when the shooting started. Someone smashed a window to get out, he said, then he and his brother started running to take shelter behind some parked cars.
Zaid said he saw Hamza get shot before he was shot himself, in the leg. He tried calling to Hamza. ‘‘He can’t hear me. I’m just waiting. Waiting.’’
Hamza made a call to his mother some time after the shooting started.
‘‘He said, ‘Mum, there’s someone come into the mosque and he’s shooting us’, and he was running with his brother who had been shot in his leg,’’ Mohamad told Stuff earlier this week.
‘‘After that I heard shooting and he screamed and after that I didn’t hear him. I called ‘Hamza, Hamza’, and I can hear his little voice and after that it was quiet.’’
Zaid did everything with his brother, he said. They both attended Cashmere High School. They were inseparable.
‘‘I love him,’’ Zaid said. He prayed for his father, Khaled Mustafa, at his funeral on Wednesday. Zaid said his father taught him how to be strong, how to be good.
Mohamad described her late husband as a sensitive man, someone who cared deeply for her and for his children.
The family moved to New Zealand several months ago; since then, Mohamad said, everyone who met her husband loved him. He was a wonderful person, she said.
The family left Syria about four years ago, moving to Jordan before coming to New Zealand last year.
Zaid said the family thought life would be better in New Zealand than in Jordan, that there would be better schools. Before they came, they knew the country was a safe place, Mohamad said. ‘‘We were shocked with what’s happened, and I think the whole community here is shocked, just like us. Noone expected this to happen here,’’ Mohamad said.
Sitting beside her at the press conference was her uncle, Khairo Tsay, a man Mohamad said she had not seen in 20 years, and who had flown to New Zealand with his wife to provide support.
She and her son also wanted to thank the wider public for their support, for standing beside them in their time of grief. From that support, Mohamad thought there would also come greater understanding – of Islam, and its peaceful nature.
At 1.30pm yesterday, a week after the terror attacks that killed 50 people and wounded dozens more, the Islamic call to prayer was broadcast nationwide.
It was followed by two minutes of silence, time to reflect on the event and the lives that were lost. ‘‘Muslims are people of peace and love, not terrorists,’’ Mohamad said. ‘‘And I hope the whole world now can understand the real Islam, the reality of Islam.’’
‘‘He said, ‘Mum, there’s someone come into the mosque and he’s shooting us’ and he was running with his brother who had been shot in his leg.’’
Salwa Mohamad speaking about son Hamza phoning her during the shootings