Locals Gather at Sufti Community To Take Stand Against Terrorism

Spiritual leaders, mayors, law enforcement, friends and neighbors gathered at the Sufi community of Osmanli Dergahi in Sidney this evening in solidarity and affirmations with Christchurch Mosque in New Zealand following a shooting by a white supremacist on March 15th that left 49 men, women, and children dead. Above, Cooperstown’s Elsie Rhodes,First Presbyterian of Cooperstown, Carol Beechy and Tom LaBeau, First United Methodist Church of Cooperstown, and others listen Junaid Khan thanks the crowd for their support. “You coming here shows you care.” said Khan, “Facebook, twitter, they don’t matter. Thank you for taking action and coming here. It means a lot to us.” Rev. Craig Schwalenberg, UU Society in Oneonta, offered condolences to the Muslim community and notes the large number of signs of support outside his church; “I am running out of places for signs of supports for different groups effected by violence. The sheer number of ways we define ourselves as different is causing us to run out of space and run out of words.

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