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Businessman Offers to Cover Quebec Funeral Costs

ONTARIO – A Canadian Muslim business owner has offered to cover funeral costs for all six victims of Quebec mosque attack, seeing the gesture as conveying true Muslim and Canadian manners.

“That’s what Islam taught me and that’s what Canada taught me,” Paramount Fine Foods owner Mohamad Fakih told CP24, Huffington Post reported on Wednesday, February 1.

“We believe as Muslims that when you’re blessed with money, success or knowledge that you share it.”

A few dozen people were inside Centre Culturel Islamque de Québec (the Islamic Cultural Centre of Quebec) in the Sainte-Foy neighborhood of Quebec City for the evening prayers when the shooting began last Sunday just before 8 pm.

Six worshippers were killed and 19 injured in the shooting incident.

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The restaurant and grocery chain owner has also offered to pay for any repairs the Islamic Cultural Centre of Quebec may need, saying that the attack shook his family.

“I was heartbroken. So were my wife and my boys — I had to explain what happened to them in the morning. It’s not easy to explain to children,” he told CP24.

The businessman said helping with costs is one way he can be “part of the solution.”

Fakih reached out to Islamic Relief Canada, one of the country’s largest faith-based charities, with his offer.

The charity has already collected more than $100,000 through a LaunchGood campaign to help the Muslim community in Quebec City’s Sainte-Foy neighbourhood.

Islamic Relief Canada thanked Fakih for his generosity in a news release Tuesday.

“This commitment from Mohamad Fakih will go a long way in rebuilding the mosque and keeping the community together after such as tragedy.”

The organization also praised Canadians, saying it is “overwhelmed” by the outpouring of support.

Another GoFundMe page, collecting donations to be distributed by a non-profit organization called Canada Zakat, had collected $200,000 by Tuesday afternoon.