On Saturday, June 20th, 62-year-old Ejaz Choudry, a Pakistani man living with schizophrenia, was tragically and violently killed by Peel Region Police in Mississauga, Ontario. Choudry’s family called the non-emergency police line to help the man as he suffered through a state of distress, only for him to be shot to death.
Many South Asians, particularly members of the Pakistani community, came together to demand justice for him and his family. The Muslim Council of Peel and the National Council of Canadian Muslims (NCCM) released a petition calling for the firing of the police officer who killed Choudry and they, along with other organizations across the Greater Toronto and Hamilton Area (GTHA), rallied behind a call for an inquiry into his killing.
If the circumstances of Choudry’s death sound very familiar, that’s because in April of this year D’Andre Campbell, a Black man, called the Peel Region Police to his home in Brampton seeking support during his own episode of mental distress, only for police to tase and fatally shoot him shortly after their arrival. Campbell’s family are still reeling from his loss and looking for answers. The officer who shot and killed him refuses to speak with and share his notes with the Ontario Special Investigations Unit (SIU).
If this doesn’t sound familiar, that’s because outcry against Campbell’s killing and support for his family have predominantly come from Black communities in the GTHA. There was a notable absence of mental health advocates and wider public support to demand justice for D’Andre Campbell and his family. These are a few known examples from this year, which illustrate an anti-Black dynamic confronting us in Canada and across the globe.
In 2014, the Peel Police killed Jermaine Carby, while he too was in a mental health crisis. In January of this year, Jamal Francique was shot in the back of the head by the Peel Region Police while sitting unarmed inside a vehicle. More recently, Chantelle Krupka, a Black Mississauga woman, came forward detailing how, on May 10th of this year, she was tasered, shot while on the ground, and subject to an unwarranted search of her home.
Campbell and Francique were killed and Krupka was brutalized in Peel, all at the hands of the region’s police service; an area with a significant presence of Muslims and Muslim organizations, which is particularly the case in Mississauga. A Justice for Jamal vigil was held in downtown Mississauga on June 13, 2020—shortly after the “public awakening” that non-Blacks claim was spurred by the killing of George Floyd. Yet, despite the protest being in Mississauga, it was predominately organized and attended by Black people.
In the aftermath of the 2016 killing of Abdirahman Abdi, a Somali man beaten to death by the Ottawa Police Service, the wider Muslim community also failed to show up, despite him being Muslim. More recently, the group Justice for Abdirahman held a rally in Ottawa on June 20, 2020. Again, there was not a notable presence of non-Black Muslims from beyond the mosque where his family are active members, despite the turn-out of hundreds of people across Ottawa. While the Ottawa Muslim Association generously covered the costs of Abdirahman’s funeral, they are the exception and not the rule.
Soleiman (Soli) Faqiri was tragically killed at the Central East Correctional Centre in Lindsay in 2016, at the hands of Canadian Border Service Association (CBSA) officials. A year prior, a Somali man Abdurahman Ibrahim Hassan killed in CBSA custody under similar circumstances, yet again, non-Black Muslims did not similarly organize to demand justice for him as they now have Faqiri.
The disparity illustrated in the failure of Muslim communities in particular to show up for Black Lives was stark, disheartening and honestly hurtful. But when I confided in my brother my deep disappointment, he simply asked, “are you really surprised?”
We have become accustomed to non-Black Muslims neglecting to show up for Black people, both in life and death. This despite the fact that a significant number of Muslims are Black, and despite how Muslims assert that a significant aspect of our Deen and the tradition of Prophet Muhammed is to abhor racism and stand for justice. I have been well-acquainted with the hostility that myself, my family and my friends have experienced in most non-Black Muslim spaces.
Disregarding the deaths and everyday instances of state-violence that Black and Indigenous people—particularly those who struggle with their mental health—face at the hands of the police is a by-product of a white supremacist logic that renders our lives as disposable.
Anti-Black Racism in our Ummah
While there have been some non-Black Muslims and Muslim organizations in Canada asserting that they stand against anti-Black racism as of recent, this is specifically in response to the police killings of George Floyd and the subsequent protests that have swept the world. In Muslim spaces, the assertion is made that everyone is welcome, and that anti-Black racism isn’t tolerated. However, this is done in a very dismissive way—like when Black Muslims are told “but we are all equal in the eyes of Allah,” which means nothing if the broader Muslim community continues to fail to care about or show up for our Black lives.
Acting as if our Ummah has its house in order when it comes to racism and specifically anti-Black racism may make Muslims look better to an external gaze. However, this conceals how Muslims, Muslim spaces, and Muslims internationally have perpetuated anti-Black racism for centuries. Disregarding Black lives actively perpetuates harm against Black Muslims and works against the cause of justice—and isn’t justice what Muslims say Islam is about?
It is imperative not to individualize and isolate anti-Black racism or a comprehension of systemic racism and sanism. Choosing to fail to adopt an understanding of how systems of power order the world and our lives results in the disregard of the scale to which some Muslims perpetuate and benefit from anti-Black racism.
Non-Black/Indigenous people of colour in North America benefit from a state and society that sees them as “model minorities.” They are seen as “hardworking,” “law-abiding,” and “deserving.” “Model minorities” are juxtaposed against Black and Indigenous people to denigrate us and to legitimize the violence that our communities are subjected to, often without contestation from the beneficiaries. This is evident in how non-Black/Indigenous Muslims organize around their own as much as it is evident in how they don’t organize around us.
I want the family of Ejaz Choudry to have answers in the aftermath of a tragic incident that should not have happened. However, an inquiry, which this community demands as a solution, is an appendage of police reform—which has proven unsuccessful in saving Black lives and supporting marginalized communities.
A call for an inquiry supports the preposition that the police really are there to serve public interests and that small changes will support police better serving this purpose. This is despite the history of the deployment of the police as tools to exercise violence and control against low-income and Black and Indigenous people.
The inquest released in 2016, after the 2014 Peel Police killing of Jermaine Carby made over a dozen recommendations on “unconscious bias” and de-escalating crises. There was also the recommendation that the police begin to use the minimal amount of force “necessary.” Recent instances of police violence illustrate how the Peel Police are continually failing to meet these recommendations, continually failing to de-escalate crises, and minimizing their use of force.
When the call for an inquiry and bodycams is supported by organizers like Ahmed Attia—who is on the Peel Police Services Board along with two prominent local Muslim organizations—it is vital to interrogate why these organizations are regularly recommending that further funding be budgeted towards the police to solve the problems they cause and escalate.
The police readily publicly embrace people of colour—including non-Black Muslims—as a way of absolving themselves from the systemic racism they are implicated in perpetuating. Integrating into this system of power—by collaborating with people that commit violence against marginalized people—will ultimately come at the expense of those most marginalized.
Fighting for these historically violent, racist systems to accept Muslims is attempting to do the impossible. Even if integration were possible, doing so would be at the expense of the most vulnerable Muslims, including Black Muslims, Muslims living in over-policed and low-income communities, Muslims struggling with their mental health and Muslims with precarious status etc.
Even firing the police officers directly implicated in what happened to Choudry will not fix this problem and keep vulnerable people safe. Laying blame on individual officers obscures the system that produces and legitimizes their violence. Should we stop at them being fired, which they almost never are, the system that produces them once again escapes being implicated.
This is not an issue of one officer, but an over-resourced system consistently endangering people under the guise of serving. The Peel Police use 40 percent of taxpayer dollars and continue to perpetuate harm. Imagine those resources thoroughly supported housing, supporting mental health services, supporting community members experiencing gender-based violence—supporting things marginalized people need.
It is important to closely listen to the knowledge and experiences of Black and Indigenous women, particularly disability justice advocates within those communities, who have for years been organizing around police violence to imagine realities where we can live.
I am in-part encouraged by organizations like the Malton People’s Movement. They have built a local multicultural network in response to police violence (though I also recognize how this work was initiated following the unjust killing of Ejaz Choudry, despite persistent disproportionate police violence that has faced Black people in Peel).
I want all Muslims to live and fight against injustice as we see it, but I want us to understand that racism, classism, and sanism is intertwined with policing on Turtle Island.
I demand justice for brothers Ejaz and Soli, but I also demand justice for Jamal, justice for Abdirahman, justice for Jermaine, justice for Regis, justice for D’Andre, justice for Chantelle.
Let us actively demand systemic transformation. Stand up for Black Lives because your life and your Iman depend on it.
These places have abandoned us and also in someways abandoned what it means to be Muslim. Maybe it’s time to abandon them too.
Whosoever of you sees an evil, let him change it with his hand; and if he is not able to do so, then [let him change it] with his tongue; and if he is not able to do so, then with his heart — and that is the weakest of faith.
Prophet Muhammed, Hadith Nawawi
Suggested Readings:
Délice Mugabo, “On Rocks and Hard Places: A Reflection on Antiblackness in Organizing against Islamophobia” (2016)
Vanessa El Shamy, “Stephon Clark and the Muslim Battle Against Anti-Blackness“
Dr. Fatima Jackson-Best, “Black Muslims in Canada: A Systematic Review of Published and Unpublished Literature” (2019)
Sanya Mansoor, “At the Intersection of Two Criminalized Identities’: Black and Non-Black Muslims Confront a Complicated Relationship With Policing and Anti-Blackness“
Sabat is an artist and student based in the Greater Toronto Area. You can find her on Twitter at @Sabatintay or on Instagram at @sabat.ismail.
