Two million people have been killed in Sudan over the past ten years, “more than in Bosnia, Kosovo, Somalia, Haiti, Rwanda and Burundi combined.” One hundred thousand refugees were intentionally starved to death. As a result of a “Taliban-like Muslim regime” that is “waging a self-declared jihad on African Christians and followers of tribal faiths in South Sudan,” the slave trade has even started up again.

No matter where you stand on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, there is no denying that the Sudanese government is far worse than even the most right-wing Israeli government.

So, why do the US media report daily on Israel but not Sudan? Why are anti-Israeli actions common on US college campuses but there’s nary a word about Sudan? Is anti-Semitism the only way to explain the disparity?

That never seemed right to me. Oh, sure, there are big chunks of the world where Jew-hatred is taught early and often. But I know too many people outraged by Israel who are not anti-Semitic. I am one of them. (Spare me your email on the topic; I am also outraged by the Palestinians and the Arab states. In fact, I don’t like anyone.)

A column by Charles Jacobs, president of the American Anti-Slavery Group, in the Boston Globe today explains it so clearly that I felt like I must have known this all along:

“…to predict what the human rights community (and the media) focus on, look not at the oppressed; look instead at the party seen as the oppressor. Imagine the media coverage and the rights groups’ reaction if it were ‘whites’ enslaving blacks in Sudan. Having the ‘right’ oppressor would change everything. … The human rights community, composed mostly of compassionate white people,. feels a special duty to protest evil done by those who are like ‘us.’

“Not in my name’ is the worthy response of moral people.”

This is a type of racism, of course, but it is not the expected one — not anti-Semitism but a feeling of identity with the Israelis; a society that is generally white, educated and democratic stands for us generally white, educated and democratic people. Nor is it the more pernicious racism of “expecting more of the Israelis.” It is our sense of identity with the oppressor, not our racist antipathy, that makes us pay more attention.

Which is a way of saying that “Not in my name” is not a worthy moral response. … unless and until our name includes all people.

Categories: Uncategorized dw