Editorial: Escapees should be allowed refuge

By EDITORIAL BOARD

Tuesday, August 21, 2007

The genocide in the Darfur region of Sudan will likely be the prevalent human rights cause of our generation. Organizations all over the world have sought to bring attention to the slaughter of non-Arab Sudanese civilians at the hands of the government-backed Janjaweed militia. Yet, as refugees from the region flood into other parts of Africa and the Middle East, there are states that would wrongly deny them sanctuary.

Sunday, Aug. 19, Israel rejected admittance through their borders to roughly 50 African refugees. Their reasoning: It is against Israeli law to allow refugees from enemy states entry to the country. Sudan’s government is classified as an enemy of Israel. The fact that these refugees are also the enemy of the Sudanese government (which doesn’t officially carry out genocide, but supports those who do) apparently held no sway.

The refugees had traveled through Egypt on their way to Israel, and been allegedly subjected to brutality on the part of the Egyptian military, charges which Egypt has yet to respond to. However, Israeli military officials claim to have witnessed Egyptian officials executing and brutalizing refugees. The asylum-seekers who were turned away from Israel will likely be forced to return to Egypt, where they may be killed.

This is not a case of immigration for economic or even political prospects. The people escaping Darfur are literally running for their lives. Laws are generally the glue that holds societies and nations together, but in this case, Israeli law is unjust.

Many Israelis agree. Members of the Knesset, Israel’s legislative body, are signing petitions, urging the government to allow Sudanese refugees to remain in the country. Civilian volunteer workers are trying to help the 400 or so refugees who have been allowed to stay in Israel find housing and employment.

In an increasingly hostile region, Israel should have been a beacon of light to those whose livelihoods had been destroyed in Darfur. Instead, as has occurred all too often in this conflict (which has been going on since 2003), Israel turned out to be another dead end. It does not have to be this way.

Israel has the opportunity to do right by these asylum-seekers, and must remember that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend.” Its citizens and areas of its leadership seem eager to accept these people; now the government as a whole must become as progressive as its population.

Besides the fact that taking in these refugees is far and away the right thing to do, Israel stands to better its image with black African Muslims. While earlier civil conflicts in Sudan dealt primarily with religious strife (pitting Muslims against Christians and Animists), the Darfur massacre is mostly one of racial cleansing; according to the United Nations, most of its victims are Muslim.

Israel is usually in the news for its conflict with Palestinians. It could, however, grab notoriety for assisting numerous desperate people in their time of need. That, we maintain, would be a vast improvement.

Comments

academic (anonymous) says...

The editorial states:

"Israel is usually in the news for its conflict with Palestinians. It could, however, grab notoriety for assisting numerous desperate people in their time of need. That, we maintain, would be a vast improvement."

I wish that were true. The good that Israelis have done for Sudanese victims has largely gone unnoticed and underappreciated. I hope that this criticism is not the very first time that the Kansan has mentioned Israel’s involvement with Sudanese refugees.

Israelis have provided international aid – whether for desperate Sudanese, hungry Muslims in Central Asia or impoverished African families – because it is the right thing to do, not because they might get a quid pro quo such as “notoriety.” When Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs launched international aid programs in the 1960’s, Foreign Minister Golda Meier knew full well that Israelis would probably reap no diplomatic benefit, but Israelis and their government helped newly decolonized Africans to feed themselves anyway, even after their new African governments failed to support Israel when she came under military attack.

During the Holocaust, Jews asked no single country to take all European refugees. Israelis should not be blamed for failing to solve the Darfur problem single-handedly. Nor should the very real security risks to Israelis involved in welcoming citizens of a hostile country be discounted. Israelis have helped many Sudanese families and will continue to do so. Other nations and even the UN must help as much as possible, too.

August 22, 2007 at 9:08 a.m. ( | suggest removal )

Advertisement