San Diego teen collects supplies to give to kids at Islamic Center of San Diego

Nearly two weeks after a deadly attack at the Islamic Center of San Diego claimed the lives of three community members, a local teenager is leading an effort to bring comfort and encouragement to the children affected by the tragedy.

Seventeen-year-old Sarah Abdin is assembling gift bags for the roughly 140 students whose lives were ultimately saved by victims of the attack. Filled with art supplies, fidget toys, sketch pads, and other small gifts, the bags are intended to provide support and positivity for children still processing the events of the attack.

“After such a tragic event, obviously, and these kids should never ever have to go through something like this,” Abdin said.

Working from her family’s home, Abdin has already prepared around 100 gift bags and plans to distribute 150 in total to ensure every student receives one.

“I’m giving 150 just in case,” she said.

For Abdin, the project is deeply personal. She attended the Islamic Center’s school as a child and remembers the sense of community it provided. She also knew Mansour Kaziha, who helped operate a store at the mosque and was among those killed in the attack.

“When I was attending Saturday school, I would always go over to his shop,” Abdin recalled. “He was very sweet. He always had such a good smile on his face. He brought so much good energy to the mosque in general.”

Motivated by those memories, Abdin said she wanted to give back to the community that helped shape her childhood.

“I just wanted to give back to the community that gave to me as a kid,” she said.

The effort has quickly grown beyond what she could have accomplished alone. Donations of supplies and financial support have poured in from across San Diego, while friends and family—including her younger sister—have helped assemble the bags.

“Honestly, if it wasn’t for the community donating and supporting and reposting, all of that, I wouldn’t truly have been able to do this,” Abdin said.

The attack has sparked broader conversations about hate, violence, and the experiences of Muslim communities. Abdin said she struggles to understand how young people could be driven to commit such an act.

“Coming from my perspective as someone that age, I could never understand how someone could come with so much hate, especially at such a young age,” she said.

She believes social media and growing divisions in society contribute to an environment where harmful attitudes can become normalized.

“We’re surrounded by social media now and, in general, dehumanization—just so much terrible stuff that is normalized every single day,” Abdin said.

At the same time, she hopes her project sends a different message.

“From my perspective as a Muslim my whole life, we’ve never been taught violence. We’ve never been taught to do terrible things like this,” she said.

As local residents rally around the Islamic Center, state leaders are also responding. Governor Gavin Newsom recently announced an $80 million grant program for nonprofit and faith-based organizations facing heightened threats, doubling the amount originally proposed in the state budget and citing recent attacks, including the one in San Diego.

According to the California Governor’s Office of Emergency Services (Cal OES), five organizations serving San Diego’s Islamic community applied for grants but submitted incomplete applications and were not included among this year’s recipients.

In a statement, a Cal OES spokesperson said: “Every community deserves to feel safe gathering, worshipping, learning, and accessing services. This is why Cal OES is committed to helping nonprofit organizations facing heightened threats of hate-based violence.”

For Abdin, however, the focus remains on the students.

She plans to distribute the gift bags in early June, timed to coincide with graduation ceremonies for pre-kindergarten through third-grade students.

The final day to donate supplies is June 7. Any additional funds raised will be used to purchase more supplies for the children.

Through a simple act of generosity, Abdin hopes to honor those lost while reminding young students that they are supported by a community determined to respond to tragedy with compassion.

“I really had a lot of fun there,” she said of her years at the Islamic Center school. “I just wanted to give back.”

This story was originally reported for broadcast by NBC San Diego. AI tools helped convert the story to a digital article, and an NBC San Diego journalist edited the article for publication.