How The Gaza War in 2012 Sparked A Malaysian To Leave Corporate World and Establish a Nonprofit : The Story of Al-I’tisam Relief Inception
I had the pleasure to meet Al-I’Itisam Relief Program’s team last year. In the first few minutes of that meeting, I was already hooked by their story. From what supposed to be a quick meeting, it ended two hours! Time flew soo fast!
Listen to their stories, written by the founder and his team…
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Through my 20 years of experience of working with Multinational Corporations as well as being the proud owner of businesses, I became exposed first-hand to the world of Non-Profit Organisations. I have helped raise funds for a local Masjid renovation and I found it to be a fulfilling experience. The satisfaction from being able to give back to the community in such a way, it was a satisfaction I never got from my countless years of working.
By Allah’s will, a group of friends and I were grief-struck when Gaza was attacked in 2012. Our hearts were moved by the daily bombings with no regard to the suffering of children, women, and elderly suffering. . We have decided that it was time for action. My group and I pushed for aggressive fundraising and together, we personally went to Gaza to deliver aid. Being there, in a true war zone, did it occur to me; there’s no such thing as a one-off
help. There would not be an end to this war and it cannot be a temporary aid.
We must do more. A few of us banded together and with a team of astounding, industrious, and like-minded people, Al-I’tisam Relief Program Association incepted.
It has been an uphill climb since but its rewards have been immeasurable. To those reading so far, I thank you and I would like to personally ask that you join our cause, and together, we can aid the misfortunate of the world.
Let’s together get towards fulfilling good deeds, and may these deeds turn into a never-ending, flowing river of rewards, a cycle that helps one another, and may we see each other in the rewards of Akhirah.
Yours sincerely,
Mohd Shah Sapiei
Chief Executive Officer
Syria
WE ARE PROUD TO BE MALAYSIANS,
AND YOU; OUR DONORS, SHOULD BE PROUD TOO.
We have done many missions than we care to remember since the inception of Al-I’tisam on April 8th 2013. One of the many countries we have worked is Syria. We have several programs implemented regularly in this war-torn country such as Back to School, Winter Aid, Food Aid, Disaster Relief, qurban and aqiqah, Ramadhan projects and many more.
We have successfully built our own team of volunteers. We called them “Syrian Refugees Action Group” or Team Syurga (Jannah). They have worked for us since the early days, operating the field kitchen at the city of Douma in 2017. The city was heavily bombarded for months by the government forces. One of their target was any facility that provide any kind of assistance to the general population that were trapped inside the city. Eventually, they found our kitchen. It was totally destroyed with a single rocket in February 2018 but fortunately nobody died as all our volunteers were outside distributing food.
Al-I’tisam Field Kitchen in Douma, Syria. We cooked 500 pax of ready-to-eat meal per day
The kitchen was rebuilt, but was again destroyed on April 8th, 2018. A few days after, the city was captured by the government and all our volunteers with several thousand people managed to flee and they now live in northern Syria as internally displaced people (IDP).
Distributing food to hundreds of families in Douma who make bunkers 20 feet underground as their home.
Alhamdulillah, the IDPs still remember what we did for them when they were in Douma. Everytime when we visit their IDP camps, the moment they see the Malaysian flag 🇲🇾 on our vest, they will start to get very excited and shouted Malaisie, Malaisie, Malaisie. Other camp residents will start to jovially crowd around us. To them, Malaysian (Al-I’tisam) saved them from starvation during those dark days in Douma. They are very thankful for that.
We were surrounded by the IDP camp residents in city of Albab everytime we visited them; Malaisie, Malaisie, Malaisie. WE ARE JUST SO PROUD TO BE MALAYSIAN
The Malaysian flag is always well recognised in many countries; Arakan, Rohingya camps in Bangladesh, Nepal, Palestine, Syria, Yemen and last but not least Cambodia. They always feel grateful because Malaysian (NGO) will always be among the first to arrive with aids whenever disaster struck their homes or war that changed their life forever.
Our Jalur Gemilang (Malaysian flag) 🇲🇾 is well known to the neediest no matter where they are. We are very proud to pin our Malaysian flag on our vest. WE ARE VERY PROUD TO BE MALAYSIAN.
YOU; our donors should feel proud too. It is impossible for us to carry out any kind of project without your donations. WE ARE VERY PROUD OF YOU TOO.
Sewing Class Grows To A Sizeable Cottage Industry
In Cambodia, Al-I’tisam Vocational School Project, started out in 2015. From a sewing class for own use, eventually turned into a cottage industry. It remains and still active until today.
This project mainly targets the youth who are jobless and has left school. This is the first project for the village focusing on skills training. The achievement of this sewing class is our joy as it has grown to be a small business capable of sewing a variety of clothing.
Some of them managed to produce clothes and sell them around the Region by motorcycle or “remmork”.
This project has made significant difference to the villagers and provides opportunities and resources to the villagers, especially to the Cambodian community in general. Support this initiative here
Rohingya Project
Al-I’tisam started activities for the Rohingya community in 2015. Among the activities during this period were food donations, winter aid, iftar project, qurbani (udhiyah), emergency aid, tube wells (565 unit completed as at Disember 2020), children education, shelters (334 Shelters in Kutupalong Camp, Bangladesh), solar panel project etc.
One of the most impressive projects is the construction of a school for illiterate Rohingya children. These children have been denied the right to a perfect education for so long. Many of them dropped out of school. Many too can’t read or write, having dropped out of school at a very young age.
To date Al-I’tisam has successfully built 6 new schools and 2 more are still under construction. So far we have successfully helped almost 1600 children to get a condusive and safe school Alhamdulillah.
We plan to add more schools in the future so that more Rohingya children are free from illiteracy InsyaAllah. As Nelson Mandela says, “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”
“Can I please borrow a kilogramme of rice?”
This COVID-19 is global pandemic, Malaysia too is not spared from the damage caused by this pandemic especially to the country’s economy. When economy suffer, people suffer too. Those daily wage earners and tourism based income earners are worst hit. Many other sectors seeing bleak future if this virus is not contained. Their situation is now to the extent they have to borrow a kilogramme of rice just to feed the family for a day or two. Yes, this is true story. There too many daily wagers and the poor who need help due to this pandemic. Are you concern? Let us help them, together we can make miracles happen!
