Brooklyn, Inshallah, a feature documentary, follows three genuine Americans: Pastor El-Yateem, running for NYC Council from Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, Muslim activist Linda Sarsour, and a local community organizer, Abeer Qawas as they mobilized the Arab community to stand up for their values. Now we are ready to begin editing, but we cannot do it without your help. Join us in these last steps towards finishing this film!

Brooklyn, Inshallah is a documentary in the cinéma vérité tradition. We have over 600 hours of real time footage of Pastor El-Yateem, Ms.Sarsour and Ms. Qawas at campaign events, in meetings and talking to voters.  With your support we will edit this footage into a feature length documentary showing how these activists mobilized the Arab community and built a broad coalition joining religious groups, ethnic groups and community activists. 

Extremely timely, relevant and immersive, this film shows Arab Americans who have lived in New York City for almost two centuries, but who have never had anyone to run for office before. In the previous election, only 250 out of 40,000 Arab Americans in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, even thought voting was worth the effort.  But this bold campaign registered over 700 Arab Americans in Bay Ridge in this ground-breaking primary.  Every Arab American community – every ethnic community can learn from this experience.

Although Pastor El-Yateem lost a close primary race, the story of how he mobilized the community – a mobilization that will extend to future elections – and the story of the struggle of the Arab American community in Trump’s America must be told. 

We have managed to get through production on minimal funding and a lot of blood, sweat and tears. We now hope to start post-production. We need to raise $30,000 to edit this film. Although we need more than $30,000 to actually finish this film, this goal will greatly further the film's completion. Editing is the most important part of the documentary process because it is where the story is crafted and finessed. 

Making this campaign a success will require lots of small donations and a few big ones. We greatly appreciate any help that you can offer – no amount is too small. Another way to give is to spread the word, please help share this LaunchGood link on your social media or email.  Thank you so much for checking out this project and for considering joining the community around this film.

Together we are a team with the documentary storytelling, political and personal experience to make this film. Just to name a few, the team includes Sarah Friedland, Producer, a Jewish documentary filmmaker based in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn. Her films have been screened at festivals around the world and have been broadcast nationally in the U.S. Kirsten Johnson, Consulting Producer, whose film CAMERAPERSON premiered at Sundance 2016, was shortlisted for an Academy Award, won the National Board of Review “Freedom of Expression” prize, and won three 2017 Cinema Eye Honors.