Darfur

Southern Sudan Update

Rabbi Shawn Zevit — Sat, 26 Feb 2011 13:36:38 -0500

In late 2010, the Referendum in Sudan brought a remarkable voter turnout of over 97% and an overwhelming 98.83% vote in favor of succession, issuing the birth of the world's newest state, South Sudan. American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee

For more information, resources and references on this historical turning point, visit http://www.interaction.org/Sudan

The formation of the new state brings many new challenges to its people even as it is diverting attention away from the ongoing crisis in Darfur.

It is our hope that the resurgence of media coverage of the region will reinvigorate donations to the JCSR. We invite you to reach out to your community to alert them that the Jewish Coalition for Sudan Relief (JRF is a coalition member) continues to collect donations in support of our ongoing efforts to bring life-altering services to the vulnerable people of Sudan.

On Behalf of the Jewish Coalition for Disaster Relief

phone 212-885-0851

fax 212-370-5467

http://www.jdc.org/jcdr_main.html

Resources for Fighting Genocide in Darfur

Rabbi Shawn Zevit — Tue, 31 Aug 2010 13:25:56 -0400

Darfur Resources: 2010 Letter to President Obama Poets and Artists for Darfur African Women Writers on darfur

Fast for Darfur

Rabbi Shawn Zevit — Thu, 11 Jun 2009 19:30:55 -0400

On April 27th, Mia Farrow began fasting in solidarity with the people of Darfur, who face ever worsening suffering since Sudanese President Bashir expelled over a dozen aid organizations from the country.

Mia Farrow had to stop fasting due to health reasons, and since then elected officials, activists, and celebrities including Congressman Donald Payne, musician Peter Gabriel, as well as hundreds of activists in over 35 countries have joined the fast, forming a chain of fasters. For six years, a genocide has raged in Darfur.

Each day, mothers and fathers living in camps look into the eyes of their children knowing that they would sacrifice anything for them — but being unable to provide them with the basic food and clean water that they need. As the rainy season threatens mass migration and epidemics in Darfur, rabbis across the continent are invited to fast June 18th. I will be doing this to coincide with the last day of a three day solidarity fast with Rabbi David Saperstein of the Religious Action Center and other clergy and international activists trying to end this ongoing genocide. Visit www.fastdarfur.org for more information on the fast.

For those of us fasting in solidarity with the people of Darfur, our hunger is a choice and a temporary state. But there are hundreds of millions worldwide — in Darfur and elsewhere — who feel powerless and who have no choice. They are crying, and we must hear them.

Rabbis, Cantors and student clergy:
The fast is a water-only fast, from sundown June 17th to sundown June 18th. So that we may keep track of those fasting and create a community of solidarity, please RSVP to me at SZevit@jrf.org

For lay leaders, communal staff, educators and congregational members please see Ruth Messenger's AJWS initiative to join in the effort.

Dor Hadash, Recon Pittsburgh affiliate man to eat Darfuri refugee diet for 30 days.

JTA coverage of Jewish community participation.

From the Fast for Darfur website: www.fastdarfur.org

"The UN World Food Programme (WFP) has reduced the daily food ration for Sudanese refugees to 1,050 calories — about half an average person’s minimum daily requirement — because donor countries have contributed less than one-third of promised funds for 2006. This severe food cutback, together with attacks on civilians and the humanitarian aid operations trying to help them, endangers the lives of over 2.5 million uprooted Sudanese.

In response to this food ration reduction, many concerned citizens have begun a fast of 1,000 calories per day to stand in solidarity with the victims of genocide in Darfur. Our 40-day fast, which began on May 9th and end on June 17th, has two specific goals: First, we demand the protection of civilians in Darfur through the immediate intervention of an international peacekeeping force of sufficient size and strength to end the genocide. Second, we challenge donor countries to fulfill their promises to fully fund humanitarian aid operations in Sudan and Chad. We appeal to persons of good faith everywhere to reflect upon the urgent situation in Darfur and take action in support of these goals."

Please circulate as you deem appropriate,
L'Shalom,

Shawn

Rabbi Shawn Zevit
Director of Outreach and Tikkun Olam
Congregational Consultant
Jewish Reconstructionist Federation
101 Greenwood Avenue
Beit Devora, Suite 430
Jenkintown, PA 19046
Cleveland Office: 216-591-1886
www.jrf.org/darfur

JCPA 2009 Plenum Resolutions- JRF National Religious Organzation, Voting Member

Rabbi Shawn Zevit — Sun, 22 Mar 2009 15:52:53 -0400

For your information, here are the resolutions that came out of the recent JCPA plenum. In the two years since JRF became a member religious organization and fourth Jewish movement in the JCPA, we have participated in many coalitions and sign-on initiatives. This Plenum marked the first time we were a national religious organization co-sponsoring three of the resolutions below. Thanks to Carl Sheingold (JRF Executive Vice-President), Bob Barkin (JRF President) and Val Kaplan (JRF Chair of External Affiliations) for representing us and voting on our behalf at the Plenum.

Full list of 2009 JCPA Resolutions

Full listing of partner organizations and sign-ons,

JCPA
JCPA speaks to you each week, alerting you to what the community relations field is doing to safeguard the rights of Jews here, in Israel, and around the world and to protect, preserve and promote a just, democratic and pluralistic American society. For three generations, we have brought together diverse voices in the Jewish community to unite a strong Jewish public policy force.

Date: March 11, 2009
From: Max Mulcahy, Program Director, JCPA

Below are the final versions of the JCPA resolutions as adopted by the 2009 Plenum. Click on the links to access the resolution text in pdf format. Please share these resolutions with your board and leadership. If you have any questions please feel free to contact JCPA offices.

Strengthening the Assets of Low Income Households

Challenges in Coalition Building

Comprehensive Energy Policy

Criminal Justice Reform

Darfur

Freedom of Expression/Defamation of Religion

Supporting Comprehensive Early Childhood Care and Education Programs for All

Muslim Jewish Relations

Alleviating Hunger and Food Insufficiency among Children, the Elderly, Persons with Disabilities, and other At-Risk Individuals in the U.S. and Internationally

Reform of the Federal Poverty Measure

Tents of Hope for Darfur

Rabbi Shawn Zevit — Tue, 16 Sep 2008 09:51:16 -0400

Visit the Tents of Hope Project: www.tentsofhope.org
The mission of the Tents of Hope project is to support a one-year process in which people respond as communities to the crisis in Darfur, Sudan by creating tents that are both unique works of art and ongoing focal points within communities for learning about, assisting and establishing relationships with the people of Sudan.
The tents are not answers in themselves. Rather, they are points of entry for more concrete forms of Darfur advocacy.

Since the launch of Tents of hope in 2004, the American Jewish World Service, the Save Darfur Coalition (of which JRF and the RRA are members) and other faith and non-profit groups have joined as participating organizations.

The structure of the Tents of Hope project is decentralized and temporary. It is a one-year project in which local communities are responsible for taking the initiative to shape the project both through the creation of the tents as works of art and the use of the tents as focal points for education, advocacy and fundraising for humanitarian assistance. National coordination is focused on giving support to these local efforts in such areas as the project website and the national event in Washington, DC November 7-9, 2008. JRF congregations sent tents to Washington to be shipped to Africa, and Rabbi Shawn Zevit represented our movement at the Interfaith service at the 6th and I Street Synagogue, Sunday Nov. 9, 2008.

For more information and to register for the Tents of hope event in washington go to http://www.tentsofhope.org/homepage.aspx

For outline of the weekend and national activities see
http://www.tentsofhope.org/scheduleofevents.aspx

Photos from the event: http://www.flickr.com/photos/18128473@N00/sets/72157609365941939/

Also see http://www.jrf.org/darfur

Darfur - children playing

Brian Fink — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 23:28:42 -0400

The Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) on the ground in Chad providing trauma counseling and social services to Darfuri refugees

HIAS is the only Jewish organization with staff on the ground in Chad, where we provide services in five of that country’s camps for refugees from the Darfur region of Sudan. At the request of the United Nations, we are providing counseling and community services programs for some 90,000 refugees, including conflict resolution training, sexual and gender-based violence education and sensitization, and trauma counseling. One of the most successful activities has been HIAS-organized playgroups, which allow children to express the traumatic events of their young lives through art, music, and sports therapy.

In addition, HIAS has created a cadre of refugees in each camp to serve as community mobilizers. Participants are trained to identify and intervene appropriately so they can provide help to their fellow refugees. HIAS’ refugee peer groups empower community members and allow them to help others deal with sensitive issues in a culturally acceptable format.

To support HIAS’ activities on the ground in Chad with Darfuri refugees, please call HIAS at: (866) 871-9681 or online.

Action needed on AIDS legislation

Brian Fink — Sat, 23 Feb 2008 13:14:23 -0500

There is exciting activity happening on the reauthorization of the PEPFAR AIDS legislation. (PEPFAR = President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief).

JRF is a partner with the American Jewish World Service (AJWS) in the Jewish Coalition Responding to HIV/AIDS in Africa.

The PEPFAR legislation will be "marked-up" in the House foreign affairs committee on Wednesday, February 27th at 9:30 am (and may be televised on C-SPAN).

There are two important action items:

A conference call with Ruth Messinger on Monday, February 25, 2-3pm
An email action alert

More details follow below:

On Monday, February 25, listen in/participate on a conference call with Ruth Messinger, Executive Director of AJWS, and member of the SAJ (Society for the Advancement of Judaism, a Reconstructionist synagogue in NYC).

Follow this link to e-mail your congress-person about PEPFAR. Fill in the information, edit the text (if you wish), and hit the *send* button.

At most, this will take you THREE MINUTES. Please take this action now, send the link to at least 20 other people asking them to take the action, and them to forward to 20 others.

Visit here for more information on PEPFAR, and the work of AJWS addressing the global AIDS pandemic.

Kol HaLev to Co-Sponsor “Sounds of Justice” Havdalah Concert and Advocacy Event for Darfur

Lisa Tuttle — Tue, 05 Feb 2008 16:56:56 -0500

Start: Feb 9 2008 - 7:30pm

End: Feb 9 2008 - 10:00pm

Please join congregation Kol HaLev and more than 20 congregations and organizations throughout the Cleveland, OH area for a special community-wide event: “Sounds of Justice” Havdalah Concert and Advocacy Event for Darfur, featuring JRF's director of Outreach and Tikkun Olam, Rabbi Shawn Zevit.

Saturday, February 9th at 7:30 pm, B’nai Jeshurun Congregation, 27501 Fairmount Blvd., Pepper Pike, Cleveland, OH.

THIS EVENT IS FREE AND OPEN TO THE COMMUNITY

Help spread the word - download and post the event flyer.

Following the concert, which will emphasize the theme of tikkun olam, there will be hands-on activities for everyone to work together to encourage an end to the genocide in Darfur:

Write letters to the media, local and national legislators and the Chinese government
Decorate symbolic refugee tents with prayers, words of support, and images for a better world
Make donations to American Jewish World Service to provide much needed items for Sudanese refugees through Jewish World Watch

For event coverage in the Cleveland Jewish News see: http://www.clevelandjewishnews.com/articles/2008/02/01/news/local/darfur0201.txt

and

http://www.clevelandjewishnews.com/articles/2008/01/28/news/local/rally0125.txt

Learn more about JRF's work to end the genocide in Darfur, Sudan at http://www.jrf.org/darfur

Bet Am Shalom Takes Part in Backpack Project for Darfur

Lisa Tuttle — Wed, 12 Dec 2007 14:39:52 -0500

JWW Backpack ProjectCongregation Bet Am Shalom in Whiteplains, NY, joins the Westchester Darfur Coalition and Jewish World Watch (JWW) in providing and education for children fleeing genocide in Darfur. JWW's Backpack Project will enable children in the Oure Cassoni refugee camp in Chad to attend schools run by the International Rescue Committee. Filled with shoes, books, school supplies, soap and toothpaste (all obtained as locally as possible), the backpack allows each child to make the most of school under the most difficult of circumstances.

Backpacks are $36 each. Every dollar donated to the JWW Backpack Project will be matched dollar for dollar, up to $100,000, through the generousity of a local family foundation.

For for more information on Bet Am Shalom's Giving Program, e-mail Fran Heyman at franheyman@msn.com, and visit www.JewishWorldWatch.org

Bet Am Shalom's flyer and donation form are attached below.

Click here for a full listing of JRF's resources and response to the ongoing genocide in Darfur.

Rabbi Harold Schulweis Speaks Out Against Genocide

Tue, 19 Jun 2007 13:30:36 -0400

Rabbi Harold M. SchulweisOn April 27, 2007, Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis of Temple Valley Beth Shalom in Encino, California, California, delivered a major speech regarding genocide, the suicide of denial, and our collective responsibilities to transmit memory to our children and our children’s children.

Entitled In Honor of the Martyrs of Armenia, it commemorates the 92nd anniversary of the Armenian Genocide, speaks to all genocides, whether Armenian, the Holocaust, Cambodia, Rwanda, or Darfur, and points out the consequences to a society which remains apathetic in the face of murder.

Listen, watch or read Rabbi Schulweis’ speech.

Rabbi Schulweis, a long-time member of the Reconstructionist Rabbinical College's Board of Governers and a student of Mordecai M. Kaplan said, “Silence is the slow strangulation of conscience… Holocaust denial is not only a clear and present danger. It is a clear and future danger.” Rabbi Schulweis crystallizes, in eighteen minutes of prose and poetry, that we are...we must be… our brother’s keeper.

These materials have been made available by the The Harold M. Schulweis Institute.

Audio and video media formats are also available for accompanying speeches on the Armenian Genocide given by Archbishop Hovnan Derderian and Jewish World Watch Co-Founder and President, Janice Kamenir-Reznik.

This commemoration program was co-sponsored by Jewish World Watch, Valley Beth Shalom and the Harold M. Schulweis Institute. Jewish World Watch may be contacted directly for additional information about its programs to combat genocide and other egregious violations of human rights around the world.