Shakeel serves as the Executive Director of South Asian Network (SAN). Syed comes to SAN with decades-long leadership experience, having led the Orange County Communities Organized for Responsible Development (OCCORD) and served as Executive Director of the Islamic Shura Council of Southern California.
For more than two decades, Syed has organized minority communities to protect their civil rights and civil liberties, fostered interfaith solidarity, advanced the rights of immigrant and low-wage workers, and championed the political empowerment of minority communities. Syed continues to speak and write on these and other issues, including police abuse, mass incarceration, and the human rights of all people.
Syed has served on the boards of the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), American Friends Service Committee (AFSC), Clergy and Laity United for Economic Justice (CLUE), and Death Penalty Focus (DPF), and he continues to serve as a volunteer chaplain in the prisons.