Okay, this is insane.
Earlier this month, Israel’s Channel 10 interviewed Israeli soldiers who said they had witnessed Egyptian security officers executing several Darfur refugees.
According to Channel 10, their testimonies were backed up by Israeli military security cameras that showed Egyptian soldiers shooting and killing several asylum-seekers.
Channel 10 did not air the video.
So how is Israel responding to the refugees from Darfur sneaking across the border into Israel?
They’re sending them back to Egypt.
You would think that if any nation could be sympathetic to a people fleeing genocide, it would be Israel. Instead, they labeled the Darfur refugees as “economic refugees” and sent them back because the government that’s trying to kill them has no diplomatic ties to Israel.
Human Rights Watch is asking the Egyptian government to investigate the deaths. Given their stellar record on human rights, I can only imagine how responsive the Egyptian government will be.
Okay, so you’ve escaped Darfur, traveling on foot, surviving off of the land in the driest place on earth. You make it into Egypt, but Egypt’s reputation is such that the best result you can hope for by staying there is to be sent back into Darfur. So you make your way to Israel, a nation whose current incarnation was founded in the ashes of genocide, and they not only send you back, but deliver you into the hands of Egyptian authorities.
Disgusting. Simply disgusting.
Rick, you’re right, this truly is disgusting. As a MOT this is revolting to me. I have always had issues with some of the things that Israel does, and have never bought into the idea that just because it is a state with a majority Jewish population that all Jews have to support it and its actions.
Unfortunately the US is partially to blame, we allow Israel to do things that would normally draw harsh criticism from many in this country if those things were done by any other country in the world. Yet, we tell ourselves that since it is somewhat of a democracy, lets not forget that the Israeli parliament is made up of parties that get proportional representation, i.e. vote for the party, not the person, and the party appoints the representatives, that it is okay for Israel to commit some questionable actions.
If the fools who love to talk about good and evil and start preemptive wars were to apply their logic, or at least the logic they used to swindle the people of this country into an unnecassary war, across the board Israel would be one of the first countries we invaded.
It is just a shame that this is what it has come to, denying asylum to refugees from a genocidal conflict.
The Darfur refugees have gotten enormous support from countless Jewish groups throughout the U.S. It is only logical that these groups must use all their influence and power to encourage Israel to change it’s policy. If they don’t then their hypocrisy is just as great or greater then Israel’s. Here is a wonderful opportunity to show, not how wonderful Israel is, but rather how civilized people should behave. Why must people make it so complicated to do what is decent and honorable? Personally, I think it is not necessarily a lack of compassion, which is not a particularly constructive emotion, but rather a lack of empathy, which is a far deeper and more complex emotion. Indeed, it is the fundamental of all great art, because only through it can we begin to understand what other people feel and experience.