{"id":324427,"date":"2026-05-20T10:53:10","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T10:53:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/324427\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T10:53:10","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T10:53:10","slug":"san-diego-mosque-shooting-who-were-the-victims-crime-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/324427\/","title":{"rendered":"San Diego mosque shooting: Who were the victims? | Crime News"},"content":{"rendered":"

Authorities at the Islamic Center of San Diego confirmed the identities of two men killed in a shooting incident at the mosque on Monday. This came a day after friends and family identified Amin Abdullah<\/a> as the security guard who was killed while trying to prevent suspected attackers<\/a> from entering the mosque complex. Mosque authorities told Al Jazeera the other two victims also played a role in responding to the gunmen.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe call them our brothers in the community. We call them our martyrs and our heroes,\u201d said the mosque\u2019s imam, Taha Hassane.<\/p>\n

Two teenage attackers opened fire<\/a> at the San Diego mosque while police officers were already looking for one of the attackers after his mother alerted the police, concerned that her son was suicidal and had run away, the police chief said. The suspected gunmen were later found dead of apparent self-inflicted gunshot wounds. Police have been investigating the attack as a hate crime.<\/p>\n

Here is a look at the victims of the attack:<\/p>\n

Mansour Kaziha<\/p>\n

Kaziha, 78, also known as Abu Ezz, was a longtime employee of the mosque who had called the police before he was killed, the chairman of the mosque\u2019s board of directors, Ahmed Shabaik, told Al Jazeera. He added that, originally from Syria, Kaziha was married with five adult children. \u201cHe was a cornerstone, a pillar of this masjid.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shabaik said Kaziha had been with the mosque since its construction in the 1980s.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe does everything in the mosque, all the everyday demands. He also ran the gift shop inside the mosque and was behind all the cooking during Ramadan for iftar and made the suhoor meals,\u201d Shabaik said.<\/p>\n

Yasser Kaziha, Mansour Kaziha\u2019s son, described his father as not only a pillar of the community, but \u201ca pillar of our household\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe taught us to expect hardships and push through them to fill our individual purposes just like he did,\u201d Yasser Kaziha said during a vigil Tuesday evening.<\/p>\n

\"ThisThis undated photo provided by Yasser Kaziha shows his father, Mansour Kaziha, right, who died in the Monday, May 18, 2026 shooting at a San Diego mosque, and his mother, Sabah Kaziha [Yasser Kaziha via AP]Nader Awad<\/p>\n

Awad, 57, lived across the street from the Islamic Center and attended prayers \u201cevery single day\u201d, Hassane said.<\/p>\n

When he heard gunfire, Awad ran towards the building, where his wife is a teacher at the school.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe left his home, trying to go and do something to help,\u201d Hassane said during the vigil.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhen he heard the shots, he ran into the masjid to help, he also diverted some people who were coming to the masjid at the time,\u201d Shabaik said.<\/p>\n

Speaking at a news conference on Tuesday, Hassane said Awad\u2019s wife is a teacher at the Islamic school, and he was a devout member of the community.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe is every single day at the Islamic Center, joining the prayers every single day,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Amin Abdullah<\/p>\n

After Abdullah, 51, was identified by reports as one of the men killed in the attack, tributes poured in online. A Facebook profile associated with him has 1,800 followers and lists Abdullah as married.<\/p>\n

Local media reports suggest that Abdullah<\/a> was a father of eight.<\/p>\n

United States officials said the guard \u201cplayed a pivotal role\u201d in preventing the attack from being \u201cmuch worse\u201d. \u201cIt\u2019s fair to say his actions were heroic,\u201d San Diego Police Chief Scott Wahl said at a news conference. \u201cUndoubtedly, he saved lives today.\u201d<\/p>\n

His daughter Hawaa Abdullah<\/a>, surrounded by family members at a Tuesday news conference, said her father was loving and supportive, a \u201cbest friend\u201d and a role model. He took his job protecting the community so seriously he sometimes wouldn\u2019t eat during his shifts, she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe wanted to save his food until after he left the job because he was afraid that if he were on his break, something bad will happen,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Abdullah greeted all visitors to the mosque with a smile and the traditional Muslim greeting in Arabic of \u201cas-salamu alaikum\u201d, or \u201cpeace be upon you,\u201d according to Mahmood Ahmadi, a longtime attendee. Another friend, Shaykh Uthman Ibn Farooq, said Abdullah was there nearly every single day and was dedicated to his wife and eight children.<\/p>\n

Abdullah was raised as a Christian, and described in a 2019 YouTube video his journey discovering the Islamic faith after graduating high school. Farooq said he met Abdullah shortly after he became a Muslim in the 1990s. Most recently, they had gone on a pilgrimage to Mecca together.<\/p>\n

\u201cAmin was born a Muslim to an African American mother. He was as American as one can get. He was also as Muslim as one can be. He was killed by guns fired by two American young men,\u201d Kashif-ul-Huda, a biotech professional and former colleague of Abdullah, wrote for Al Jazeera in an essay<\/a> published on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

\"AminAmin Abdullah [Courtesy of Kashif-ul-Huda]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Authorities at the Islamic Center of San Diego confirmed the identities of two men killed in a shooting…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":324428,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[723,27695,5364,348,100,236,6163,74,76,75,435,9098],"class_list":["post-324427","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-crime","tag-explainer","tag-gun-violence","tag-investigation","tag-news","tag-police","tag-religion","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news","tag-united-states","tag-us-canada"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324427","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=324427"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/324427\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/324428"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=324427"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=324427"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=324427"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}