About 5,000 mourners attended Wednesday’s funeral of a Muslim girl whose beating death, blamed by police on a motorist’s road rage, has some people in her community fearing for their safety.
Some wearing Islamic robes, others in street clothes, they left their cars as traffic overflowed and walked more than a mile to reach her mosque.
Nabra Hassanen, 17, was remembered as a shining example of kindness and openness during the services.
“There is nothing like losing a child, especially in the way that we lost Nabra,” said Imam Mohamed Magid, the religious leader of the All Dulles Area Muslim Society. He stood before Hassanen’s coffin, covered by a black shroud decorated with quotes from the Quran.
Police said Hassanen was bludgeoned with a baseball bat early Sunday by a motorist who drove up to about 15 Muslim teenagers as they walked or bicycled along a road. Police said the driver became enraged after exchanging words with a boy in the group. A Hassanen family spokesman said the girls in the group were wearing Muslim headscarves and robes.
Magid said he sought to comfort the victim’s mother by telling her that a person who dies in such a manner will enter paradise with no questions asked.
He acknowledged that the slaying has people grieving and fearful, but he praised the many people who turned out “in a fever” to search for the teen before police discovered her body Sunday afternoon.
An overflow area at the funeral was itself overflowing with people who came to show their solidarity. The crowd overwhelmed suburban traffic, and cars jammed into neighborhood streets more than a mile away to park.
Most mourners were Muslim, but Christians and Jews attended as well. The ADAMS Center, one of the largest mosques in the country, has a long history of interfaith outreach and activism, and ADAMS board chair Rizwan Jaka said there has been “just a tremendous outpouring of support” from people of all faiths.
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