Member Spotlight: Muslim Women Australia

Maha Abdo is the CEO of Muslim Women Australia.

1. Tell me how Muslim Women Australia got started.

It was started 43 years ago by a small group of women who were trying to find their feet, their confidence, and a sense of belonging. It was not long after the White Australia Policy era, and many women were navigating settlement with very little support. It was just doing simple things, gathering together, building friendships, and making life feel a little less lonely. I joined as a young mum.

Domestic violence was on the rise, it was an issue happening across Australia, not just in our community. I could hear older women talk about it and see the Imam take women into a safe place in his home with his family. So, we set up the first Muslim women refuge in 1988, which was government funded. From that, we grew into an organisation now that fully employs professional social workers to deal with settlement issues, trauma-informed practice, youth and elderly. We’re community housing providers and we provide domestic violence support and accommodation. We have evolved as the needs evolved and respond to what the community wants.

2. What are the big issues you’re working on at the moment?’

Covid taught us a lot about our strengths. Covid was a time where we were forced to operate under very hard conditions, and at that time, we were the only ones operating when everything else had closed down.

One thing that came out of that time was young women worked closely with older women. They helped older women navigate social media and helped them communicate via WhatsApp.

Out of that, we developed a Muslim Youth Advisory Committee to advise MWA on issues, and last year, the same group launched their own strategy and their own business plan. Young people are not just the future. They’re the present, and they are responding and now being authentic in the way that they engage with the community.

We’ve also recently launched our Core and Cluster accommodation model, which is exciting because it reflects a different way of thinking about safety, dignity, and belonging. We learned during COVID that large congregate settings could increase risk, yet isolation also harms people. Core and Cluster offers privacy without isolation: women have their own space, and there are shared communal areas, almost like a village model, where women can support each other while still having boundaries, quiet, and dignity.

We’ve also got our podcast, On Purpose. That’s exciting because it was started by young people. They wanted to learn more about the history of the organisation and talk about issues affecting them.

3. You’ve written about how the phrase ‘social cohesion’ has been weaponised against Muslim people, can you tell me more about that?

Speaking truth to power is not easy, especially in this current moment. We struggle but we keep on doing it. Right now, social cohesion is being used to literally silence dissent, and at the same time, it puts our community into a difficult position. We’re seen as either a risk or a threat, so therefore, put your head down, be thankful and stay silent.

We have lived through this cycle before. This is what was done during the Gulf War crisis in the 90s, when the Bali bombing happened, and when the 11th of September happened. Now we realise the impacts of this, cohesion cannot exist without accountability, without justice and without the right to speak truth, even when its inconvenient.

When we are told, “lower the heat,” what it often means is: don’t challenge power; don’t name harm; don’t question double standards. But instructing communities like ours to constantly manage other people’s comfort is what breaks cohesion. It forces us to justify belonging, and it questions our loyalties. Real cohesion is not silence.

4. This week is the International Day for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination, how can we build a society that opposes all forms of racism?

I think about this deeply, and I always return to the heart. Because if you go underneath the politics and the noise, what every human being wants is the same: to be accepted with respect and dignity. Every family wants safety. Every community wants to belong without humiliation. The question is: how do we make that real, not just written in documents?

We need a trusted space where honesty and courage can rise above hatred and division. And I think we also need to stop placing the burden on marginalised communities, communities already under pressure, to be the ones constantly explaining racism, or constantly proving they are “good enough” to belong.

I want to pass the question back, to what are we willing to change in ourselves, in our institutions, and in our public narratives, so that dignity is not conditional?

For me, building an anti‑racist society looks like truth‑telling, courage, integrity, respect, and genuine relationships. It requires a willingness to be uncomfortable, to sit with stories that challenge us, to listen with the heart, not just the mind. And it means we don’t come together by forcing conformity. We come together by respecting difference, and choosing each other anyway, because our shared humanity is bigger than what divides us.