Cultures of genocide connect to find a solution
By Rebecca Villaneda Peninsula News
Monday, February 11, 2008 4:50 PM PST
SAN PEDRO — Temple Beth El’s Jewish World Watch chapter in San Pedro on Tuesday hosted two native Darfurians who spoke about the mass killings that have occurred since 2003. The Sudanese government has claimed more than 400,000 lives and continues to slaughter in the refugee camps where Darfurians live after thousands of their villages have been destroyed.
History is the factor in the killings, according to Abu Asal Abu Asal and Ibrahim Adam. Both now live in the United States.
They travel with Voices of Darfur, a national speaking tour meant to educate the public about the genocide.
JWW, which consists of 56 synagogues in Southern California and is a member of the Save Darfur Coalition, has made huge strides to help the people of Darfur, including sending food and aid, and has built three medical clinics in Chad.
“I’ve been to many different events … Most of the sincere support we’re getting as Darfurians is through the Jewish people,” Asal said. “And it’s not a surprise because of the history that the Jewish people have.”
According to a video produced by Voices of Darfur, “after decades of neglect, droughts and oppression,” two rebel groups of agrarian farmers challenged Sudan President Omar Al Bashir.
This ignited the attacks on Darfur, and the Sudanese trained the Janjaweed militia to carry out deadly strikes intended to “wipe out the people of Darfur.”
“When you read it in the paper, [Darfur] sounds remote, [like] it’s happening somewhere else, but it’s happening in the world that we live in today,” Asal said. “It’s happening in our world and I think we’ll be so ashamed if we do not really work hard to stop it, and we can only do that by pressuring the Sudanese government.”
Both Asal and Adam told stories about their home country and their families that are scattered amongst refugee camps.
They told stories about women — young and old — who leave to collect food or firewood only to get raped by the Janjaweed. But to the females, this is better than sending out their young sons, who surely will be killed if they leave the camps.
“If they get killed, why do they go to those camps?” Asal said. “Because that’s the only way that they can get food. Unfortunately, there’s not only the Janjaweed, which is the militia that has been sponsored by the government, but there [are] … armies attacking the innocent people.”
Before leaving Africa, Asal attended college at a university just outside of Sudan. When a highly praised student was murdered by two other students who were affiliated with the current Sudanese government, Asal joined student protests, but he was detained by police forces and beaten.
That same year Asal joined the Darfur Student Association. After “hearing other students talk about the new regime and the rebel movement in the south, it made me realize how miserable the situation in Darfur was.”
Asal published several short stories and cartoons in a newspaper. In 2003, when one of his pieces was viewed as an insult to the Sudanese government, he was forced to flee from Sudan to Egypt.
Currently Asal is working on his third novel and lives in Massachusetts, while Adam lives and works in Rockford, Ill.
Adam grew up in northern Darfur, where he worked as a farmer and volunteered as a teacher. The Sudanese army and the Janjaweed destroyed Adam’s village in July 2003 — 80 people were killed, and 20 were members of his family.
“The situation is that it is still going on, there is nothing changed,” Adam said. “Eighty-five percent of indigenous people of Darfur are living in refugee camps.”
Adam told a story about his family being forced to hide in mountains for more than three weeks after fleeing the village. Hungry, his nephew and about six others tried to sneak out to find food and water, but they were gunned down by a helicopter within 15 minutes of leaving their hiding spot.
More than 100 of Adam’s relatives live in six different refugee camps in Darfur and Chad.
“I can keep working … making money and I will be able to help my own family, my mom, my sisters … But I find out I can’t help the people of [my village],” Adam said. “My own people are in the same situation as my family, so if I make money for family — Who is going to help the millions of millions?”
Adam continued, “Your voice, your concerns — that’s the only hope that gives me power and keeps me in hopes to speak out. I will ask every one of you to tell our story to other friends.”
To end the evening’s presentation, Temple Beth El Rabbi Chuck Briskin read a verse from the Torah: “Do not stand idly by while your neighbor bleeds.”
Briskin continued, “We may be from different religions, different cultures, different skin colors, but we know that when we bleed, we bleed the same color.
“We need to remember that as a Jewish community that remembers quite firmly the horrors of the Holocaust 60 years ago … We have a special responsibility to respond.”
For more information on Voices of Darfur, visit www.voicesofdarfur.org.
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