Jews active for Darfur

PAT JOHNSON

Several dozen people, including many from the Jewish community, participated in a rally for action to save the people of Darfur Sunday.

The event, which took place at the Vancouver Art Gallery, was intended to raise awareness of the precarious state of the people of Darfur, a region in western Sudan where Sudanese-backed janjaweed militias are murdering, raping and threatening genocide. The event took place in conjunction with numerous such rallies around North America.

Mark Weintraub, chair of Canadian Jewish Congress, Pacific Reigon, and chair of the national Darfur committee of Congress, said Darfur is the worst humanitarian disaster confronting the world.

"For a period of time, we were cautiously optimistic that perhaps the worst excesses would cease. But any basis for optimism has now been crushed," said Weintraub. "The deaths appear to have doubled in the last year and the Sudanese regime seems intent on carrying the conflict over to Chad and neighboring regimes.

"We are here today because we have all failed to do that which is necessary to give meaning to the post-Holocaust anti-genocidal cry for 'Never again,' " he said. "But at least we are here."

Rabbi Shmuel Birnham of West Vancouver's Har-El Synagogue spoke of the Jewish obligation to build a better world. Vancouver city councillor Tim Stevenson and Vancouver-Centre Liberal MP Hedy Fry also addressed the small crowd.

Pat Johnson is editor of MVOX Multicultural Digest, www.mvox.ca.

^TOP