Sudan

The war in Darfur is a consequence of the Islamist Sudanese Government's
deliberate expansionist policies. Who even knows that the dictator of Sudan,
Gen. Omar Bashir, came to power in a military coup in 1989, and made an
alliance with the Islamist forces in Sudan. These are affiliated with the
Moslem Brotherhood movement, that is active in Egypt and is represented in
the Palestine Authority by Hamas. The military-Islamist Sudanese Government
first attacked the Christian and nativist Blacks in south Sudan, and a war had
been going on there for over 20 years, with a million (estimated) casualties,
before a truce was signed last year.
Then the Sudanese forces attacked the Black non-Arab Muslims in the east, in
Darfur province, that is as big as France. Their reasons for doing so are
basically that fundamentalist Islam allied with Arab nationalism is
expansionist and imperialist although in the PA the nationalist and Islamist
forces are fighting each other). They are seeking to expand their realm into
the relatively empty, poor and non-Arab areas of Sudan. Even though the 2
million refugees in Darfur are Muslims, the Muslim countries have not made a
squeak about the atrocities going on there. In order to cover up their
involvement, having learned from the war in the South, this time the Sudanese Government sent in mainly militias known as the "Ganga-weed," from the drug
that they chew (like marijuana). So far estimates of the dead range from 120-180,000. According to both the US and UN, what is happening in Darfur is
genocide, the deliberate murder of an entire people by ethnic cleansing.
Talks in Abouja, Nigeria last week resulted in a truce signed between the
Sudanese Government and the main Darfur rebel movement. But, two minor
rebel groups refused to sign, and deliberations are still ongoing. The
agreement calls for the rebel groups to be incorporated into the Sudanese
Army, not a very hopeful sign for the refugees from Darfur. The agreement
also allows the UN free access to the area, that has been denied so far by the
Sudanese Government, although some ineffective African peace keepers have
been allowed in. Now the UN is trying to make up for the shortfall of funding
that forced them to reduce the allotment of food to ca. 1,000 calories per
person, essentially a starvation diet to the many refugees in Chad.
Notwithstanding that the refugees are Muslims, no Muslim country to my
knowledge has given one cent towards their rations. They leave it to the
West to do this.
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Correction: My daughter Miriam questioned the origin of the name of the Sudanese Arab militia, which I wrote as "ganga-weed" and attributed to the"ganga" plant which is a form of marijuana. However, having looked it up this is not the origin of the name, spelt as "janjaweed" it is actually a word in the south Sudanese Arabic dialect meaning "outlaw" or "horde." Aren't you glad you know!
This article is based on an article by Barry Rubin in the J'sam Post.