NEW YORK — Above a bodega in New York Metropolis’s Harlem neighborhood, a mosque congregation hosts iftar, the normal Islamic finish of quick meal, for a whole bunch of hungry migrants each night time throughout this holy month of Ramadan.
Up north within the Bronx, an imam has turned the two-story brick residence that homes his mosque right into a makeshift in a single day shelter for migrants, lots of them males from his native Senegal.
Islamic establishments within the Massive Apple are struggling to maintain up with the wants of town’s migrant inhabitants as an growing variety of asylum seekers come from Muslim-majority African nations. The problem has change into all of the extra pronounced throughout Ramadan, which started March 11 and ends April 9.
Many mosques have opened their doorways to migrants through the daytime, changing into de facto day facilities the place new arrivals can discover a quiet place to relaxation and get well, oftentimes following stressed nights sleeping on the streets or within the subway.
Muslim leaders say they’ve stepped up their appeals for donations of cash, meals, clothes and different provides in current days.
“We’re doing what we are able to do, however we are able to’t do every little thing. That’s the underside line,” stated Moussa Sanogo, assistant imam on the Masjid Aqsa-Salam in Harlem, simply north of Central Park. “These brothers, they don’t eat sufficient. They’re ravenous after they get right here. Are you able to think about? Ravenous. In America.”
Imam Omar Niass, who runs Jamhiyatu Ansaru-Deen, the mosque within the Bronx, stated offering a spot for newly arrived migrants to mattress down is the least he can do, even when it has come at nice private expense.
His utility payments have lengthy since outpaced his potential to pay. He estimates he’s behind about $7,000 on the house’s electrical energy service and one other $11,000 on water service.
“In our tradition, you may’t deny the individuals who come to the mosque,” he stated on a current Friday as greater than 50 males arrived for afternoon prayers. “We hold receiving the folks as a result of they’ve nowhere to go. If they arrive, they keep. We do what we are able to to feed them, to assist them.”
The newest migrant surge has seen greater than 185,000 asylum seekers arrive in New York Metropolis for the reason that spring of 2022, with Africans from majority Muslim nations similar to Senegal, Guinea and Mauritania among the many high nationalities represented in new instances in federal immigration courts within the state.
New York Metropolis’s estimated 275 mosques have been among the many first locations to really feel the affect of the African wave, as they’re usually migrants’ first cease upon arriving within the metropolis, stated Assefash Makonnen of African Communities Collectively, a Harlem-based advocacy group supporting African immigrants.
However relying solely on the generosity of faith-based communities—lots of that are already struggling to maintain afloat—isn’t sustainable in the long term, she stated.
Final summer season, Democratic Mayor Eric Adams introduced to a lot fanfare a program meant to supply funding, safety and different assist for as much as 75 mosques, church buildings and synagogues that agreed to supply in a single day shelter to migrants.
To date, although, simply six homes of worship holding round 100 beds have been permitted to supply further house for the greater than 64,000 migrants at the moment housed by town in motels and different shelters.
Bishop Matthew Heyd of the Episcopal Diocese of New York stated the problem for a lot of faith-based establishments is that they’re positioned in older buildings that don’t meet present fireplace security requirements.
With extra “commonsense” laws, he stated, homes of worship are ready to supply 5,000 further beds for migrants at a fraction of the price town is at the moment paying to shelter them in motels throughout the 5 boroughs.
“We wish to be a part of the answer to this. We’ve got been earlier than, and will be now,” Heyd stated, referring to a community of faith-based shelters that grew in response to town’s homeless disaster within the Nineteen Eighties.
Adams spokesperson Kayla Mamelak stated town, in response to the issues, lowered the utmost variety of beds permitted at faith-based shelters earlier this 12 months from 19 to fifteen, that means they wouldn’t be required to have sprinkler programs underneath metropolis constructing codes.
“We’re making modifications the place we are able to,” she stated. “Clearly the well being and security of the folks we’re sheltering must be the precedence. You simply can’t stroll right into a church and switch it right into a shelter.”
Within the Bronx, Niass stated he hasn’t given town program a lot thought. He additionally careworn he doesn’t acquire hire from the migrants, in distinction to the unlawful, dangerously overcrowded migrant boarding homes town has shut down in current weeks.
Nonetheless, the situations on the mosque are lower than best.
On a current go to, males rested on the ground of a basement prayer room in between the day’s 5 prayer occasions. Extra lounged out within the yard, the place there was a microwave and sizzling water kettle arrange for getting ready primary meals, in addition to a shed for storing baggage and a row of file cupboards for incoming mail. Close to the driveway was a transportable rest room lined in a blue tarp that did little to masks the odors that drew swarms of flies.
Malick Thiam, a Senegalese migrant who has been staying at Niass’s mosque for a few month, stated he’s grateful for the hospitality however appears ahead to discovering a spot of his personal.
The 29-year-old, who arrived within the nation in August, stated he’s not too long ago began work making late-night meals deliveries. He stated he sometimes returns to the mosque as others stand up for early morning work shifts, permitting him to keep away from conflicts as males jockey over sleeping spots.
“Typically they obtained combating, typically they obtained many issues,” Thiam stated, talking in clear however at occasions damaged English as he relaxed within the mosque’s yard. “Residing right here is just not straightforward. It’s tough. It is rather, very tough.”
Again in Harlem, Alphabacar Diallo is equally grateful for the assist Masjid Aqsa-Salam has offered, however is anxious to get on together with his life. Like many others coming for iftar, the 39-year-old migrant from Guinea says he’s nonetheless ready for work authorization some eight months after arriving within the nation.
Till then, the mosque gives him a spot to maintain heat, fed and near the religion that’s sustained him.
“With out the masjid,” he stated in French by way of a translator, “I don’t know the place I’d be.”
