Rabbi speaks out on African genocide

Rabbi Lee Bycel wasn't born during the Holocaust, when the world stood by until it was too late. When the Rwandan genocide happened in 1994, he took no action.

"I didn't do one thing during Rwanda," he said. "I didn't write one check. I didn't call one congressman."

Now, Bycel is not willing to let the horror in Darfur pass by without taking a stand.

Four years ago he spent the Yom Kippur holiday at a refugee camp in Chad, where many refugees from the troubled Darfur region of Sudan have fled.

"It brought back to me what the meaning of the holiday is all about," he said of the Jewish Day of Atonement.

In Juneau, Bycel spoke before the World Affairs Council and Congregation Sukkat Shalom as executive director of the Western Region of American Jewish World Service, an organization dedicated to alleviating world poverty, hunger and disease.

Bycel has three points he makes in his talks about Darfur, but in Alaska he adds a fourth.

First, pressure needs to be put on the Chinese government, which sells the Sudanese government 90 percent of its small arms.

Second, the United States needs to work with allies to get more peacekeepers on the ground, the full 26,000 authorized. Only 9,000 to 10,000 are now in place.

Third, the United States needs to be more generous about getting humanitarian aid in, including paying for getting the peacekeepers in place.

Fourth, the Alaska Permanent Fund Corp. needs to divest from companies supporting the Sudanese government.