World’s ‘first openly gay imam’, Muhsin Hendricks, shot dead in South Africa

Muhsin Hendricks, widely regarded as the world’s “first openly gay imam,” has been shot and killed near Gqeberha, South Africa, in what police are investigating as a targeted attack.

According to The Guardian UK, Hendricks, who founded a mosque as a sanctuary for gay and marginalised Muslims, was in a car with another person on Saturday when assailants blocked their vehicle and opened fire. 

“Two unknown suspects with covered faces got out of the vehicle and started firing multiple shots at the vehicle,” police said. “Thereafter they fled the scene, and the driver noticed that Hendricks, who was seated at the back of the vehicle, was shot and killed.”

A video circulating on social media purportedly shows the killing in Bethelsdorp, near Gqeberha, and has been confirmed as authentic by police. “The motive for the murder is unknown and forms part of the ongoing investigation,” authorities said, urging anyone with information to come forward.

The International Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Trans and Intersex Association condemned the killing. “The ILGA World family is in deep shock at the news of the murder of Muhsin Hendricks, and calls on authorities to thoroughly investigate what we fear may be a hate crime,” said its executive director, Julia Ehrt.

Hendricks, a vocal advocate for LGBTQ+ Muslims, publicly came out in 1996. He began hosting meetings for LGBTQ+ Muslims in his home city two years later. “I opened my garage, put a carpet down and invited people to have tea and talk,” he told The Guardian in 2022.

In 2011, he established a mosque after a friend endured a sermon condemning homosexuality. “I said, ‘Maybe it’s time we started our own space, so people can pray without being judged’.” The Al-Ghurbaah mosque in Wynberg, near Cape Town, describes itself as “a safe space in which queer Muslims and marginalised women can practise Islam.”

Hendricks, the subject of the 2022 documentary The Radical, had previously acknowledged threats against him but refused to live in fear. He said he had been advised to hire bodyguards but insisted that “the need to be authentic” was “greater than the fear to die.”

Born into a Muslim family, Hendricks married a woman and had children before coming out to his family at age 29. He later worked as an Arabic teacher and fashion designer while dedicating his life to LGBTQ+ advocacy within Islam.

This comes a few weeks after a 38-year-old man, Salwan Momika who ignited violent protests in 2023 for burning the Quran, was shot dead in Sweden.  

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