Utah’s Muslim community — shaken by mass shootings 7,500 miles away at two mosques in New Zealand — received support from friends and strangers on Friday via texts, telephone calls and a planned “flash mob," organized by two government officials.
“It’s tragic,” said Shuaib Din, imam at the Utah Islamic Center in Sandy, “and it should be alarming to all of us, the rise in hate crimes. Not just to Muslims, but to different minorities and ethnicities and people of different color and creed.”
Din said the shooting “has been worrisome to people in our congregation,” and he has received several calls from people “who were definitely nervous.