People Are Pitching In To Buy A Quebec Mosque Shooting Victim A New Home

Aymen Derbali saved lives when he drew the shooter's attention. Now he needs a new home that can accommodate his disability.

Aymen Derbali risked his life to save others during the Quebec City mosque shooting, and it left him paralyzed. Now he needs a home that accommodates his disability.

Tariq Syed

Derbali was shot seven times on Jan. 29 when a gunman entered the mosque and opened fire on worshippers gathered for evening prayers, killing six and injuring 19 others.

According to a Globe and Mail feature, Derbali drew the gunman's attention in the hopes that it would let others escape.

"I tried not to panic or flee," he told the newspaper. "I tried to concentrate so that he wouldn't fire on others."

Derbali spent two months in a coma and several months more recovering from his injuries, which have left him paralyzed from the shoulders down and using a wheelchair.

People have launched a fundraising campaign to help Derbali buy a wheelchair-accessible home.

Tariq Syed

Tariq Syed, who works with the Muslim organization DawaNet, has been regularly visiting the Quebec City Muslim community since January and helped organize the fundraiser.

He told BuzzFeed Canada that Derbali has no appropriate home for when he leaves the recovery centre where he's spent much of the last year.

"He’s in desperate need of a place where he can move in," Syed said. "Once they discharge him, he will not have a place."

Tariq Syed

Before the shooting, Derbali lived in a small two-bedroom apartment with his wife and three young children. He has been unable to return home except for brief daytime visits, according to Syed, because the bathroom and most other parts of the apartment are not set up for him.

Friends looked at about 50 different homes before finding one that could accommodate Derbali's needs.

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The cost of the house, as well as some additional modifications, will come to $400,000. The fundraising campaign raised more than $20,000 in less than a day.

Syed said Derbali was "very overwhelmed" by the idea of strangers pitching in to help him out.

"He doesn’t think he’s a hero. He says he did what should have been done."

But Syed isn't surprised that so many people have been moved to help Derbali. A previous DawaNet fundraiser to help the families affected by the shooting raised $400,000 from thousands of people across the country, including from remote communities and First Nations that sent envelopes full of cash to the mosque.

"One thing we learned is how Canadians come together when someone is in need. It doesn't matter what faith background, what culture, what race they come from," he said.

Syed, who is also making a documentary short about the mosque shooting, said it's important that the massacre and its victims are not forgotten.

"This is something that really happened in Canada," he said. "We cannot forget this."

Tariq Syed