User:Nomaris/sandbox

Everything Big is what I have incorporated, the rest was already on the Alianza Islámica published Wiki. Everything in Italics has been added to the page.

The Alianza Islámica is a Latino-Muslim organization in the United States. It was founded in 1987 by a group of Puerto Rican Muslim converts and was the United States' first Latino Muslim organization .[1][2] '' Alianza was established in El Barrio, New York City. ''

'' The alliance was built with the intent to not only bring people of the community together "but to improve that community and it's quality of life". A founder of the organization, Rafael Montañez Ortíz, expressed concerns "  that neither the African-American-majority nor the immigrant-majority communities sufficiently addressed Hispanic-American culture "'', language, social situations, and contributions to Islamic history.[3]

Those quotations I added, but the quote was already there, it just was not stated to be a quote.

In El Barrio, Spanish Harlem, the Alianza has mediated between rival gangs, mentored jailed Latinos, provided education about HIV/AIDS, offered GED (General Education Development Test) courses, helped the sick get treatment, and given free meals during Ramadan.[4]

History
Alianza Islámica created the first masjid for the Spanish-speaking community. Through wedding celebrations, congregational prayers, English and Spanish sermons, sharing traditional Puerto Rican dishes without pork, music and poetry gatherings, etc., Alianza Islámica was able to present itself as an integral organization of the local community.[5]

Alianza's founders were inspired by their personal experiences, as their Latino identities was used against them by ''other mainstream Muslim groups to disregard them.  Other Latinos had converted to Islam before Alianza but the founders found that many would hide their Latino identity to fit into Muslim spaces. An example of this would be not speaking Spanish in a mosque. However, not all Latino Muslims at the time were doing this, Bani Sakr, a Puerto Rican Muslim group established in Newark, New Jersey, embraced the way their Latino identity and Muslim beliefs could coexist. The founders of the Alianza felt that there was "an expression of [themselves] that no longer looked foreign or alien". ''

''Ibrahim Gonzalez was a congero and pianist, and in the early 1980s he makes the first Spanish translation of the leaflet Islam at a Glance, which he printed and distributed himself. Gonzalez' goal with Islam a un Vistazo was to get the attention and recognition of Islamic Society of North America and Islamic Circle of North America. However neither showed interest in highlighting what was for Gonzalez, an important milestone for Latino and Muslim communities. ''

As Gonzales and other member saw the lack of recognition from Muslim communities and groups, that were in its majority composed of Arab, South Asian, and, in less numbers, African-Americans, they decided to establish Alianza Islámica. ''Once the community organized to become the alliance they created a flag that consisted of the flag of Puerto Rico, with a moore in the center holding a sword and two symbols of African and Taíno descent. The Alianza was properly established in the year 1990, as they acquired a building to re-purpose into the first mosque in El Barrio. ''

''Ramon Ocasio, who is now in his late sixties, was a station master for the New York commuters system. Ocasio was born and raised in New York City, his formative years were during the 1960s and '70s. He was "radicalized" as young man by nationalist Puerto Rican groups such as the Young Lords. He grew to care about the causes of these groups because of the conditions under which he grew up in. The politics then made him turn to religion, "you have to have a moral foundation, you have to make better people" said Ocasio for an interview with NPR (National Public Radio) on December of 2016. ''

''Ocasio was inspired by the Nation of Islam, and so that translated to the work Alianza was doing, as they helped under-served people in spaces through their programs. These people were often struggling financially, with drug-addictions, and poorly educated. ''

''In recent years, a new community has risen through the internet. Ocasio has expressed that he feels that because of the particularity of the cases of the people who reached for the Alianza were in. It was the intertwined process of spirituality that spoke to them, he believes. ''

''Ocasio and his family would, and still to this day, receive backlash from both Muslims and non-Muslims because of his Latino identity, in relation to being Muslim. ''

Yahya Figueroa Abdul Latif, was a director of Alianza for many years

Fall of Alianza
''In 2005 a fire burned down the mosque in which Alianza was first established. As most of the founders were growing older, they decided to not take on the task of starting all over again. ''

''Despite of Ocasio's concerns with he has stated that "[he] sees this as an extension of that [the Alianza]." in the first in-person meeting of the new group. ''

One of the founders of Alianza Islamica, Ibrahim Gonzalez, died on June 4, 2013.[6]