Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Martyrs and Heroes Remembrance Authority, released a statement yesterday urging "the world to act before it is too late." The statement says,
"The aggregate of news reports about the situation in Darfur [Sudan] indicates that the escalating humanitarian crisis includes aspects of ethnic cleansing and perhaps even genocide. During the era of the Holocaust, the world was slow to respond to news about the murder of six million Jews. In the 1990s, unrestrained genocide occurred in Rwanda with little or no international acknowledgement of it until after it had ended. It is imperative that we learn the lesson from past failures to respond in time to evolving, genocidal evil. Yad Vashem urges the leaders of the nations of the world to take immediate concerted action to halt the tragedy in Darfur before it devolves further, to provide effective humanitarian aid to the region and to punish the perpetrators of the heinous crimes that are being committed there."
Yad Vashem, created by the Knesset in 1953, is dedicated to Holocaust remembrance, documentation, research and education. Director Avner Shalev explained today that he hopes that Yad Vashem's voice, added to those around the world warning about the sorry situation in Sudan, will help stir the world to concrete action.
The UN recently passed a strong resolution calling for sanctions against the Sudanese-government militias blamed for what has been described as a "humanitarian catastrophe" in Sudan. A long-running civil war exploded last year when rebels attacked government property, accusing the government of neglecting mostly black Darfur in favor of the country's Arab population. The government then established Arab militias to put down the rebellion. The militias are now accused of expelling black Africans from the remote section of the country, and in fact many of the latter have either been killed or fled to neighboring Chad.
"The aggregate of news reports about the situation in Darfur [Sudan] indicates that the escalating humanitarian crisis includes aspects of ethnic cleansing and perhaps even genocide. During the era of the Holocaust, the world was slow to respond to news about the murder of six million Jews. In the 1990s, unrestrained genocide occurred in Rwanda with little or no international acknowledgement of it until after it had ended. It is imperative that we learn the lesson from past failures to respond in time to evolving, genocidal evil. Yad Vashem urges the leaders of the nations of the world to take immediate concerted action to halt the tragedy in Darfur before it devolves further, to provide effective humanitarian aid to the region and to punish the perpetrators of the heinous crimes that are being committed there."
Yad Vashem, created by the Knesset in 1953, is dedicated to Holocaust remembrance, documentation, research and education. Director Avner Shalev explained today that he hopes that Yad Vashem's voice, added to those around the world warning about the sorry situation in Sudan, will help stir the world to concrete action.
The UN recently passed a strong resolution calling for sanctions against the Sudanese-government militias blamed for what has been described as a "humanitarian catastrophe" in Sudan. A long-running civil war exploded last year when rebels attacked government property, accusing the government of neglecting mostly black Darfur in favor of the country's Arab population. The government then established Arab militias to put down the rebellion. The militias are now accused of expelling black Africans from the remote section of the country, and in fact many of the latter have either been killed or fled to neighboring Chad.