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Jews Decry Sudanese Genocide

Confirming my argument in the thread following JB’s recent controversial post, that genocide is not to sole-exclusive tactic of the Nazi party, nor are the Jewish people its sole exclusive victims, news of such horrors becomes enough in Sudan that people actually start giving a real shit. Thus, this week, the US Holocaust Memorial Museum has declared a genocide emergency in Sudan.

Wherever such attrocities rear their ugly head, we must be adamant in fighting them. Thankfully, we are, to what extent we can. But we can and should do more. Contact your local reps and ask them to please, please, do more to intervene on behalf of Sudan’s black population.

Anyone know a good place to send tzedakah to help the situation? And how ’bout petitioning Israel and the US to draft a UN resolution condemning the actions of the ethnic Arab majority in Sudan? That ought to blunt their teeth quite nicely, and we’ll get to see how many on the UN Security Council sign off on it… Bet the number will be apalling…

[Update] Here’s the e-mail I just sent the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs:

Hello, my name is Daniel Sieradski and I am an American citizen currently residing in Israel who is contemplating making aliyah within the next two or three years.

I am writing today with regards to the current crisis in Sudan. I humbly petition your office to seek the drafting and submission of a United Nations resolution condemning the actions of the ethnic Arab majority in Sudan which is currently committing unspeakable acts of genocide against the native black population of the country, which I fear are none too dissimilar from the attrocities which we as Jewish people have endured countless times throughout our history.

As Jewish people, and more importantly, as the Jewish State, I think it is incumbent upon the nation of Israel to actively rise up against all such attrocities, wherever they take place, as too few have done for us in times past, so that we may serve as an exemplar and be truly the light unto the nations of which we hold the potential to be. We can do so, I believe, by demonstrating our moral certitude in our condemnation of these attrocities before the world.

I recognize that the UN has not been such a great friend to Israel, and I also recognize that the history of the UN has been disproportinately skewed in favor of even the most foul and brutal of Arab regimes, thus I recognize the futility of this action. However, with the latest findings of the UN Court of Criminal Justice against Israel’s separation fence, I believe that making a statement such as this would put the UN in a position to “put up or shut up,” and further provide Israel with the evidence it needs to demonstrate to the world that the UN is not necessarily acting in the best interests of peace and humanity.

Further, I would recommend the intervention of the Israeli government in the situation, perhaps even militarily, by performing a rescue operation in the region. Even if the Arab world were to see it as a provocation, it is doubtful that the rest of the rational world would condemn Israel for acting in the interests of humanity. The pro-peace and pro-Palestinian community would have a lot to answer for if they did not support such an action.

I recognize that I am incredibly idealistic, but if I did not place this idea before you, I will feel as though I had failed in doing all that I believe is in my power to put an end to this wretched situation.

Thank you for your time,

Daniel Sieradski
Katamon, Jerusalem

If you feel compelled to send along a similar note, you can e-mail it to [email protected].

11 thoughts on “Jews Decry Sudanese Genocide

  1. ah, the naivete of the post; as if israel has any persuasive abilities at all in the world; dude, we are jews; the arabs want to kill us and the western world will tolerate us; only the us, britain, australia and a handfull of small contries like us. thats reality.

  2. i believe if israel stands up for justice then we will earn the world’s respect. if we defend the downtrodden, then the downtrodden will support us.

  3. You are correct about Israel earning the world’s respect but in addition to intervening when a sufficient number are being killed so as to qualify it as genocide – Israel must regain its self respect by intervening for those who risked life and limb for the Jewish State and were abandoned by both Israel and those who usually champion Israel’s downtrodden friends and neighbors. These are:
    1) Jonathan Pollard. Israel’s refusal to take the steps to gain his release make it undeniably obvious that it is the Jewish State who has abandoned Jonathan Pollard (with a little help from American Jewry’s exceedingly polite behavior), not the US.
    2) The Southern Lebanese Army. In return for short-term publicity gains Israel fled Southern Lebanon, abandoning their allies to be butchered and driven from their homes. In return we got an Arab population that smelled the sweet smell of Jewish exile waft through the mountains and valleys of the Land of Israel and we got the Temple Mount War (al-aksa intifada, if you will).
    3) So-called ‘collaberators’ – Arabs who have turned in bombers, passed on intelligence information, and literally saved thousands of Jewish lives. We let them swing from tall poles in the town squares of Ramallah and Shechem while thousands cheer in glee and shout about how their idol they call a god is great.
    4) There are more, and I don’t mean to do that thing where someone goes: “Why bother with the Sudan – we have so many problem of our own to deal with,” I just mean to let you know that even us settler-types lust after Justice and distrubute consolement to those who have been abandoned by the world.
    If the activist, truth-seeking Jews of the hilltops could get together with the activist, truth-seeking Jews of Pardes, Hartman, Shenkin, Emek Refaim and all the other places – we can truly bring on the Great Shabbat.

  4. word. i concur ez. tho i dunno about pollard so much as the other cases… he was spying on my native country, which, regardless of my support for israel, is a big no no as far as i’m concerned.

  5. I feel it’s necessary to call you on this “their idol they call a god” business, Ezra. I’m surprised Mobius let that stand.
    Idolatry is a serious charge. In fact, for both Jews and Muslims, it is perhaps the most serious of all charges. Why is that? Because you are saying that instead of worshipping and following God and bringing glory to his Name, the accused are doing the complete opposite of that.
    Now, I’m not saying it is justified to stand in the street and cheer a public execution (though I should mention this is something with a long history in Western, as well as Islamic, society). But to generalize from such a spectacle to the idea that Muslims do not worship the same God we do is going too far, in my opinion. In fact, if I were a Muslim, I would perhaps accuse those who engage in such acts as engaging in a sort of Muslim chillul Hashem, since they have clearly made Islam and their way of following God look evil to you, Ezra.

  6. Avi, what the fuck is your problem? The Darfur issue is intimately fused with the ongoing Arab-Muslim establishment’s rejection of Israel and Zionism, as well as the consistently sordid history of Arab rejectionist posture against the national self-determination of any non-Arab peoples — be they Jews, Kurds, Berbers, etc. Do you have to be a simplistic contrarian every waking moment of your life?

  7. zionista, you are of course, factually correct. but if we as jews and/or israelis raise those issues, we are imediately discounted as vile destroyers of the palestinians, and our views are not taken into account by: the arab and muslims states and people(thats about 40 or 50 countries, and about 1 billion people); the vast majority of the eu, paticularly the political and intellectual elite (another 25 countries and 450 million people)…need i go on? we as jews and israel as a nation have been marginalized, the work of the various mideast studies programs, the bbc, the guardian, npr, the left in general, have suceeded (in all but a small number of countries) in making jews and israel pariah entities. we have ifluence as jews only in america. sorry to be so pessimistic, but that the reality. and i guess thats why im so adament about the lethalness of the mobys, browns and arafs of the world – we have enought antipathy and downright hatred directed at us by way too many; jews who lend themselves to israeli and/or jew bashing merely provide the moral fig leaf that emboldens those who would otherwise hesitate to harm us. wish i were wrong, but dont think so.

  8. As Mobius said, word. The [primarily U.S.] Jewish Coalition for Disaster Relief can use your / our help. See their website: http://tinylink.com/?7kI2cDqJiT
    Also the Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA) – see the first site below the dotted line
    The larger community, as well as the Jewish community specifically, is speaking out and trying to respond to the disaster in the Sudan. If you don’t read the New York Review of Books religiously, see for instance, the item / link I found at http://www.workingforchange.com entitled “Disaster in Darfur,” located at: http://tinylink.com/?wCl5AMrS1D
    [Basically, `John Ryle on the unfolding genocide in Sudan — an atrocity that might be stemmed by US troops, were they not in Afghanistan and Iraq.’ ]
    …………………………………………………………..
    There are a number of websites with news of UK and UK Jewish organizational comments and responses. See for instance:
    http://tinylink.com/?csUuTkCBgg
    http://tinylink.com/?LeQFjpZkeP
    http://tinylink.com/?mPsAgF1ED8
    http://tinylink.com/?MPP146LFKC
    http://tinylink.com/?PawxgOFwHn
    http://tinylink.com/?LFucDqg2ci
    http://tinylink.com/?gwGVUT22P1
    >> Arieh Lebowitz

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