Muslim-run crowdfunding site has raised $650m for good causes around the world

Having originally struggled to find backers, founders were struck by how communities pull together to address needs large and small

Displaced Palestinian children wait for food rations in Deir Al Balah, Gaza. LaunchGood has helped to raise money for displaced Palestinians. AFP

US Muslim crowdfunding site LaunchGood has raised about $650 million for charitable causes around the world, harnessing the power of the community to help those in need.

After founding the company in 2013, Chris Blauvelt, Amany Killawi and Omar Hamid were struck by how communities can pull together to help address needs large and small.

Having struggled to find backers for their idea when they started the company in Detroit, Michigan - a state with one of the largest Muslim communities in the US - they now employ more than 100 people around the world.

LaunchGood, which like fellow crowdfunding site GoFundMe is a for-profit organisation, has raised money from donors in 5,000 cities.

Mr Blauvelt says the founders were primarily interested in raising money for Muslim groups and causes connected to the community that might be overlooked or dismissed due to discrimination.

“I believe it’s better to mean something to somebody than to mean nothing to everybody,” he tells The National.

“We feel the Muslim community, on a global scale, is very underserved, and there are some unique challenges and opportunities within the community that need to be addressed.”

He points out that “zakat”, or almsgiving, is one of the five pillars of Islam.

From big causes to small

The homepage of LaunchGood has recently featured projects to raise money for Rohingya refugees, feeding displaced families in Gaza and helping those affected by flooding in Bangladesh.

Al Noor mosque in Christchurch. After the March 2019 attacks on the mosque and another in the city, the LaunchGood platform helped raise $2 million in 48 hours for the community. AP

After the March 2019 attacks on two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand, the platform helped raise $2 million in 48 hours for the local Muslim community, receiving donations from Jack Dorsey, who was chief executive of Twitter at the time, British actor Riz Khan and American actress Alyssa Milano.

The platform has also raised funds for causes on the smaller scale. In 2020, a Muslim farmer and father of nine in Orange County, Virginia, was involved in a head-on collision and left in a critical condition.

Groups and people on LaunchGood raised more than $1 million for the man and his family – which he described as a miracle.

And in 2022, the platform was used to raise more than $20,000 to pay for cancer surgery for Bosnian woman Rajza Selimovic, 23.

Because of the size of the tumour and the need for specialist care, Ms Selimovic needed to travel to Turkey.

The effort was initiated by a relative, Mevludin Sahinovic, an Arabic teacher in the UK, who said it took only a week to set up the page for her.

“The team they have were really on top of everything,” he tells The National.

Mr Sahinovic says the surgery was successful and Ms Selimovic is doing much better, recently completing a degree in electrical engineering.

the platform has also raised money for causes not connected to the Muslim community.

In February 2017, hundreds of gravestones were destroyed or defaced at a Jewish cemetery in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania – the second anti-Semitic incident in a week, after similar damage to a cemetery in St Louis, Missouri.

Rohingya Muslims flee military operations in Myanmar's Rakhine state across the border to Chittagong in Bangladesh in April 2017. Their cause is one of many aided by funds raised on US Muslim-led crowdfunding site LaunchGood. Anadolu

Myanmar's Rohingya refugees make their way through muddy water after crossing the Bangladeshi border to the Cox's Bazar mass refugee camp. Anadolu

Children queue for food from a charitable organisation in a displaced people's camp in Khan Younis, the southern Gaza Strip, on June 15. Funds for displaced Gazan families have also been raised on LaunchGood. EPA-EFE

Palestinians return to Khan Younis after the Israeli military pulled out troops from the southern Gaza Strip on April 30. Chris Blauvelt, one of LaunchGood's founders, says the Muslim community, on a global scale, is very underserved. EPA-EFE

A child in a life jacket swims through floodwater after collecting relief materials in Feni, south-eastern Bangladesh, on August 24. Victims of natural and man-made disasters, and people who can't afford life-saving health care, are among those helped by LaunchGood projects. AFP

Flood-affected people take shelter inside a school building in Daganbhuiyan, Bangladesh, as they wait for the water to subside on August 25. AFP

A headstone, pushed off its base by vandals, lies on the ground near a smashed tomb in the Jewish Mount Carmel Cemetery in Philadelphia, the US, in February 2017. Two Muslims used LaunchGood to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars to replace the damaged memorials. Reuters

Volunteers start to restore and repair vandalised headstones at the Mount Carmel Cemetery in February 2017. APA

Rajza Selimovic, having completed the Sarajevo half-marathon days after cancer surgery made possible by LaunchGood. Courtesy of family of Rajza Selimovic

Rajza Selimovic and family as she travels to Turkey for vital treatment made possible by LaunchGood

Within hours, two Muslims who run a group called Celebrate Mercy used LaunchGood to raise hundreds of thousands of dollars to repair the headstones.

After Harry Potter author JK Rowling praised the effort on social media, interest rose to such a pitch that it crashed the site.

Jewish Federation president and chief executive Naomi Adler said at the time: “The massive outpouring of support we’ve received from the city of Philadelphia and from communities across the world has been truly astonishing.”

'It feels like sometimes the world's against you'

Mr Blauvelt says it was clear that Muslims and Muslim communities are struggling in many places around the world. It “just feels like sometimes the world's against you”, he says.

The impact of the platform is not simply about raising money, he says, but changing “the mindset of the global Muslim community”.

With almost two billion Muslims in the world, “we should be able to do something”.

In the years after the September 11, 2001, attacks, there has been “a lot of fear around terrorism financing”, Mr Blauvelt says.

The founders of LaunchGood, who are also planning to launch a payments system, commissioned a study that found “you’re four or five times more likely to face banking issues if you're Muslim”.

The Jerusalem Post reported in October last year that Israel’s Diaspora Ministry had raised concerns about the site, saying that “it is not impossible” that some of the funds being donated through the platform to help Palestinians in Gaza could be funnelled to extremist groups.

"All the organisations listed are credible organisations in good standing with their regulatory authorities," Mr Baluvelt says when asked about the article.

"In fact, even the US government has repeatedly asked Israel for proof of these baseless allegations and have not been able to get any for years."

LaunchGood is “by far the strictest platform and often follows up with proof of use of funds”, he adds.

"Our compliance standards and processes are unmatched in the industry - we're held to a different standard and accept it, and thus go above and beyond."

Corrections: A previous version of this story said that the group had raised $520 million, that the planned payments system was only for Muslim groups and that company employees worked primarily out of Detroit. These have been corrected.