By Benjamin Minick
As the COVID-19 pandemic ripples across the globe, people of all nationalities are being impacted on a scale that has never been seen before in modern human times. A severe lack of personal protective equipment (PPE) and shortages of medical equipment are profoundly impacting healthcare workers across the world. Here in the United States, one may think that it’s such issues don’t affect us, but that’s simply not true. These issues don’t see add socioeconomic divide, so how can we find a way to face a seemingly impossible task?
The Muslim American Leadership Alliance or MALA is doing something about it. This organization that is full of many amazing people is reaching out to some of its members for help. One of these people is professional basketball player Enes Kanter of the Boston Celtics. When the NBA season came to a halt, he was left with a lot of time on his hands, and he began to look for ways that he could contribute to the community.
Enes has a financial means and a platform that most of us don’t. While he is working on staying fit during the break in the season, the majority of his efforts have been focused on contributing money and resources to acquire masks for healthcare workers throughout the greater New York area and Chicago. To date, he has provided thousands of masks and continues to work on procuring more, taking this time to focus on the human aspect.
When asked why he decided to contribute, he said, ” All of us live here no matter what we do for work, we are all being impacted by NBA players that single parents. It is better to have something to do that is going to be positive than to sit there and just worry about things that we cannot control.” and we all have to look after each other everybody has to give what they can to make sure that all of us can make it through this traumatic experience to try and live life after COVID-19.
When asked about what he thought life was going to be like after covid-19, he seemingly echoes the same feeling that the majority of us feel when he went on to say: “I’m not sure exactly what life is going to be like when this is all over sadly we are going to lose a lot of people are going to be sick, but maybe this will help us to learn how to live as a people regardless of our religious beliefs or skin color. I want to help as many people as I can because this is terrible. This is the kind of thing that you see in a third world country; we are essentially a third world country now. There is something to be learned from this experience.”
Enes Kanter has a history of human rights causes, and he chose to partner with MALA because their mission doesn’t focus directly on the religious aspect of things but people from all walks of life. He continues to contribute to the organization by providing personal protective equipment and funds for food and shelter. When it comes down to it, he’s just a person that has something to offer other people, and he isn’t asking anything in return; he just wants people to get better, and he wants to return to basketball.
When news came out about the suspension of the league, Enes was preparing for a game against the Milwaukee Bucks when a former teammate and friend called him to let him know that their game had just been canceled and the league was suspending the season. This was particularly shocking for him because he is a former player of the Utah Jazz and had recently played against his former team. This goes to show that no matter what your station in life, this illness can reach out and have an impact on your life. He said: “With the season being suspended indefinitely, the only thing that he could focus on was trying to stay in shape. Some players have basketball courts in their homes, and some people have apartments, so it’s challenging.”
The Muslim American Leadership Alliance is working steadfastly with some of it’s a very high-profile membership to procure personal protective equipment to be distributed to healthcare workers across a wide swath reaching from New York to San Diego, California. Fashion designer Naeem Khan, Enes Kanter, Kal Loul, and six-time Grammy Award Malik Yusef are just a few of these fantastic people that are stepping up the help anyone they can regardless of religious race or economic standing. This provides the example that we should all continue to set irrespective of whether there’s a pandemic or we’re just operating in everyday life. This is what it means to be an American.
Benjamin Minick is a military analyst and freelance journalist, who specializes in defense and ME affairs.
