A Responsibility to Act

June 9, 2008

by Daniel E. Levenson

The images in the film are graphic and disturbing: dead bodies, burned-out villages, a child wandering aimlessly. They are images of the Darfur region of Sudan, where a genocide is taking place. I recently saw these images when I attended a screening of the film “Sand and Sorrow,” co-sponsored by the New England office of the Anti Defamation League and American Jewish World Service. AJWS president Ruth Messinger was in attendance at the event, which was held on June 5th at Cloud Place in Boston. Ms. Messinger introduced the film and then answered questions afterwards about the situation in Darfur and the steps AJWS is taking to try and help bring peace to the troubled region. “The film is provocative,” Ms. Messinger said, “but not as provocative as what is happening on the ground.”

And indeed the film was provocative. My only criticism of it was that in places where music was used to apparently heighten the tension of the images being displayed, I thought that they would have been even more powerful without the auditory addition. The clips of government aircraft attacking unarmed civilians would have been just as upsetting without dramatic music in the background, maybe even more so. In scene after scene the film shows how the lives of millions of innocent civilians have been violently disrupted by the Sudanese government and its proxy militias through a coordinated campaign of violence and terror. From government-sanctioned militia on horseback who ride into villages to rape and murder at random, to the horror of government air raids, the people of Darfur have been subject to an unrelenting wave of horror which we in the west have ignored for far too long.

One interesting point that Ms. Messinger made in her remarks which I had not heard before was about the relationship between China and Sudan. She said that not only does China buy all of its external oil from Sudan, but they also sell small arms to the Sudanese government. Putting pressure on China, Ms. Messinger noted, is one significant way to try and affect the outcome in Darfur. She urged attendees to write to President Bush and members of congress to encourage them to pay more attention to the genocide and to encourage President Bush not to attend the opening night ceremonies at the Beijing Olympics.

It is heartening to see that AJWS is one of the leading organizations pushing for greater awareness of the crisis. As Jews, we have an obligation to remember the resounding silence of the rest of the world not only during the Shoah but at other times in our history when we have been subject to persecution and oppression. There are any  number of ways that we can help raise awareness of the situation in Darfur and here in Boston the Massachusetts Coalition to Save Darfur is sponsoring a host of activities including efforts to get Fidelity and TIAA-CREF to stop investing in companies which have played a role in the crisis in Darfur.

However we choose to respond to this crisis, one thing is clear, and that is that we must respond somehow. On the other side of the world people are dying, and we in the American Jewish community have a responsibility to take action.