• Khadija Thabti says she can no longer bear to be alone outdoors.
• When she hears sirens, she’s immediately brought back to the night her husband Aboubaker and five others were killed as they prayed in the mosque in Quebec City.

QUEBEC – As Muslims mark the two years since the Quebec mosque shooting that left six killed, the family of Aboubaker Thabti, who was killed while praying, will receive financial support from the provincial organization that handles requests for compensation from victims of crimes, CBC reported.

“I’m scared all the time. I have nightmares,” Khadija Thabti said on Sunday.

Khadija had a job at a daycare before the shooting, but since then she has had difficulty working with children.

“I tried to work, but I stopped. I wasn’t capable. It was very hard,” she added.

Two years ago, a Canadian lone gunman opened fire at a mosque in Quebec City on the evening of January 29, 2017, killing six and injuring 19.

After turning down her request for compensation twice, Indemnisation des victimes d’actes criminels (IVAC), the provincial organization that handles requests for compensation from victims, approved the request on Sunday.

Mohamed Thabti says he is frustrated it took so long for IVAC to recognize that he, his sister and mother are victims of the Quebec mosque shooting. (CBC News)

Their lawyer Marc Bellemare said the fact they had to fight for two years is unacceptable.

“They will live all their lives with this weight, this trauma,” he said at a news conference in Quebec City on Sunday, announcing his client’s legal victory.

“Those delays are not acceptable in Quebec. So I hope that the minister of justice will give instructions to the public servants to accept these cases as soon as possible.

Bellemare urged anyone who was at the mosque that night, or who had family at the mosque, to come forward to IVAC to seek compensation.

“They need help,” he said. “The first responsibility of IVAC is to help people,” he added.

In recent years, the number of Islamophobic hate groups has jumped up in Alberta and some have created militia-like groups.

Statistics Canada reported a 151% spike in police-reported anti-Muslim hate crimes in 2017 following the Quebec mosque attack and the RCMP says far-right extremists have become emboldened in Canada.

Canada’s 2011 National Household Survey estimated Muslims in Canada to be around 1,053,945, or about 3.2% of the population, making Islam the second largest religion in the country after Christianity.