UNC Muslim Students Association partnered with Rise Against Hunger Sunday to work to end hunger by providing food for underserved individuals in poor countries.
Senior Abdurrehman Kamdar, an organizer of the event, said they are helping these individuals receive the nutrition they need by packaging thousands of meals as a group.
“We basically just package meals for the needy, for individuals in foreign countries that maybe, you know, they don’t have the right resources to, you know, meet their nutrition requirements somewhat not,” he said.
This event was held in memory of Our Three Winners, who lost their lives on Feb. 10, 2015.
“Our three winners, Deah, Yusor and Razan, were exemplars of human beings and they left behind a legacy of community service of community engagement of, you know, giving back to the community,” Kamdar said. “So that is what we were inspired by.”
Kamdar said UNC MSA has organized this event in the past and they are looking forward to continuing this event in the future. Over 100 students were expected to come to the event and planned to package over 15,000 meals. The meals will then be delivered to Rise Against Hunger and distributed to people in underserved areas.
Mustafa Abdoh, a sophomore who volunteered at the event, said he's Muslim, and Islam encourages helping those in need.
“I am attending this event because it speaks to the charity and feeding of poor people is so important to my religion as taught,” he said. “So it’s an intrinsic … value that I’ve (held) and this is the way, you know, to express that belief that I have, which is to help people who are less fortunate.”
Zack Karges, an assistant program manager for the Raleigh warehouse at Rise Against Hunger, said the organization started packaging meals for individuals in poor countries in 2005 and they have produced over 305 million meals since then.
