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since Wed, 26 Dec 2007 20:04:17.
The central thrust of the Save Darfur campaign is that Darfur is a moral and not a political issue. To drive a wedge between morality and politics, Save Darfur worked through religious bodies and presented itself primarily as an interreligious coalition. It offered Americans the possibility of uniting around a moral cause --Darfur-- regardless of political allegiance or ideological inclination. Where else could political figures as divided as Al Sharpton and Elie Wiesel speak from the same platform but one dedicated to saving Darfur -- as on April 30, 2006, at Washington's National Mall? Both spoke as Americans -- saviors without having to cite any other tradition in common. The Reverend Al Sharpton evoked the civil rights struggle: "This has been a long struggle, but now, when we see you here today, on the same ground that Martin Luther King came, on the same grounds that civil rights and civil liberties came, we know when America comes together, we can stop anything in the world. History will write that we came together in the first decade of the twenty-first century and stopped genocide in Sudan." For his part, Elie Wiesel evoked humanity: "We are here today because if we do nothing, Al Qaeda and the world's number one holocaust denier, the infamous ruler of Iran, Ahmadinejad, will send terrorists there .... Darfur today is the world's capital of human suffering. Not to offer our help, not to urge our government to intervene in every manner possible is to condemn us on grounds of inhumanity. Darfur deserves to live. We are the only hope."
A form of religious stereotyping emerged in 2006, when the SDC began to organize a series of public rallies, the first in April and the second in September, to mobilize mass support behind an interreligious call for military intervention in Sudan. The SDC prepared several sets of "action packets" for the April 2006 rally. The packets were identified according to religious affiliation: initially as Christian Faith, Jewish, Interfaith, and General Faith. After the April 2006 rally, with some noticeable unease, Muslims were added to a "civilized" campaign: a "Muslim Faith Action Packet" was added. The faith packets conveyed a clear division of responsibility among faiths. The Christian faith packets were the most explicit: They spoke of "divine empowerment" and "the burden to save." The "Christian Sample Prayer" asked God to forgive their failure to believe that "you have empowered us to protect our brothers and sisters." The Jewish faith packets emphasized "the special moral responsibility of Jews as 'quintessential victims' to identify genocide whenever it occurs." The "Jewish" million postcards material read: "Instead of mourning a genocide, what if we could STOP one? As Jews, we have a particular moral responsibility to speak out and take action against genocide." If Christians were meant to lead and Jews to bear witness, Muslims were asked to fight oppressors in their midst. The text in the Muslim faith packet focused "greatly on training Muslims in how to aid others, deal with conflict, avoid being oppressive, and intervene when other Muslims oppress." Clearly, the executive committee of Save Darfur thought of its constituency in terms of a religious hierarchy: If Christians were empowered to save and Jews sensitized to empathize, good Muslims had the potential to check bad Muslims by fighting oppressive tendencies within their own communities.
These "faith packets" have been revised many times over. The main effect has been "to nuance claims about ethnicity" But traces remain, perhaps as testimony to an original sin. Take these examples from material accessed at the Save Darfur site on January 29, 2008. The "Discussion Guide for Christian Congregations" asks: "How will we as a congregation be the keeper of our brothers and sisters in Darfur?" And the "Discussion Guide for Jewish Congregations" asks: "Is it possible to both bear witness to the Holocaust and other events in Jewish history while acting on Darfur? Does one detract from the other?" And then: "Do Jews carry a special responsibility to victims of genocide?" But this is how the "Discussion Guide for Muslim Communities" begins: "The violence in Darfur is inflicted by Muslims on Muslims. Does that change the obligation of Muslim people around the world to intervene?" Clearly, Darfur is a Muslim atrocity to which good Muslims must bear witness.
That Muslims have a special responsibility to fight oppression in their midst is a message often conveyed by New York Times op-ed columnist Nicholas Kristof. Kristof chides Muslim and Arab peoples, and the Arab press in particular, for lacking the moral fiber to respond to this Muslim-on-Muslim violence, presumably because the violence is inflicted by Arab Muslims on African Muslims. In one of his early columns (May 29,2004), Kristof was so outraged by the silence of Muslim leaders that he asked, "Do they care about dead Muslims only when the killers are Israelis or Americans?" Two years later, he asked in an April 23, 2006, column, "And where is the Arab press? Isn't the murder of 300,000 or more Muslims almost as offensive as a Danish cartoon?" Six months later, Kristof pursued this line on NBC's Today show: "The question is, why are Muslims who, in their -- in the Quran, who are taught that killing is wrong, it's against Allah, why are they not stepping up, and telling Muslims who are killing other Muslims, to stop?"
The SaveDarfur faith packets were specifically defined with the purpose of controlling political humanitarian discourse, which Jews are supposed to lead and direct. Christians are supposed to provide the troops while good Muslims are marginalized with the task of challenging bad Muslims, who are dangerously extreme and oppressive.
Over all the movement suggested that Muslims had to learn true ethics and morality from Jews (and to a lesser extent from Christians, who are still supposed to atoning, to wit, "[asking] God to forgive their failure to believe that 'you have empowered us to protect our brothers and sisters.'"
Christian failure in the Holocaust seems to be an implicit message.
 Many displaced Darfuris live in camps across the border in Chad |
The six-year war between forces loyal to Sudan's government and rebels in Darfur has effectively ended, the UN's military commander in the region says.
General Martin Agwai, who is leaving his post this week, said the vicious fighting of earlier years had subsided as rebel groups split into factions.
He says the region now suffers more from low-level disputes and banditry.
The UN says 300,000 people have died in Darfur, but the Sudanese government puts the figure at 10,000.
Almost three million people are said to have been displaced by the fighting.
Oppression claims
Gen Agwai, who led a joint UN and African Union peacekeeping force known as Unamid, said the region now suffered more from "security issues" than full-blown conflict.
 | DISPLACED IN DARFUR  2006: 547,420 people fled their homes 2007: 302,794 2008: 317,000 2009 (first six months): 137,000 Total to date: 2.7m Source: UN humanitarian agency Ocha  |
"Banditry, localised issues, people trying to resolve issues over water and land at a local level. But real war as such, I think we are over that," he said.
Gen Agwai said only one rebel group, the Justice and Equality Movement (Jem), posed a real threat but even it no longer had the ability to conquer and hold territory.
Sudan analyst Gill Lusk said his comments were "unhelpful" because they could lead people to believe that Darfur's problems had been solved.
"There has been a large decline in fighting in Darfur, and that is undoubtedly a good thing for the people," she told the BBC.
"But it is the government that turns the tap on and off - they can restart the violence whenever they want."
An aid worker in Sudan also questioned Gen Agwai's statement.
"If that is true, why do some parts of Darfur remain out of bounds, even for Unamid?" she asked.
'Strong foundation'
Gen Agwai insists the real problem now is political.
BBC Sudan correspondent James Copnall says that view is shared by many within Sudan.
Although the intensity of the violence has reduced, there is still little prospect of a peace deal.
Last week, US envoy to Sudan Scott Gration said the existence of 26 different rebel factions was a major obstacle to reaching a peace agreement with the government.
He brokered talks which led to four groups agreeing to work together, calling the deal a "very strong foundation for rebel unification".
The war broke out in the arid and impoverished region early in 2003 when rebel groups including Jem attacked government targets, accusing Khartoum of oppressing black Africans in favour of Arabs.
Pro-government militiamen hit back with brutal force, which the US and some rights groups have labelled genocide.
Khartoum denies supporting the militias, but the international court in The Hague issued an arrest warrant earlier this year for President Omar al-Bashir accusing him of war crimes.
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