Mark Zuckerberg joins Iftar with refugees, reaffirms support to Muslim migrants

WASHINGTON: Facebook co-founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg attended on Thursday experience his first Iftar dinner with Somali refugees in Minneapolis, saying he “left impressed by your strength and resilience to build a new life in an unfamiliar place.”

“Tonight I had my first Iftar dinner with a group of Somali refugees in Minneapolis,” Zuckerberg said in his Facebook post.

“As a refugee, you often don’t get to choose which country you end up in,” said the co-founder of the social media platform with 1.94 billion monthly active users.

“When I asked one man, who had spent 26 years in a refugee camp, whether America now felt like home, he gave a simple and profound answer: “Home is where you are free to do what you want. Yes, this feels like home.”

The post took an indirect dig at US President Donald Trump’s travel ban and his stand on refugees.

His long message with the beautiful thought got nearly 2 lakh reactions and was shared more than 12,000 times.

“Tonight it was a great opportunity to have Iftar with the founder of Facebook. We have talked about a lot of things. No matter where you came from always America felt like home, home of opportunities, and values of freedom. His really a nice person who’s always respect any religion, ethnicity and background of different ideals. Let’s welcome his great idea of “bring the world closer “thank you for making us closer through Facebook”, wrote a man named Mohammad Jama who was also present at the dinner with the Facebook dinner.

William Reyes Leon wrote, “If every one in the world had your believes …the world would be a better place ….but In the mean time thank you for making us closer through Facebook.”

“Thank you Mark!!! If even one person who previously had a negative outlook on refugees reads this and it changes that outlook for the positive, I think it’s a great start!!,” said another person.