Not only is Ft. Wayne, IN home to the largest population of Burmese Karen refugees in the US it is also home to refugees from Darfur. I didn’t know that and as a matter of fact this article in the Journal Gazette today is the first mention I’ve seen of refugees from the Darfur region anywhere in the US.
Mastora Bakhiet’s family was forced to flee their home in 1996, after Arabs in her Darfur province threatened to kill everyone in her tribe.
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Six years later, after a journey that took her throughout Sudan and the Arabian Peninsula, her family won the U.S. green card lottery and eventually settled in Fort Wayne.
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Back in Darfur, members of Bakhiet’s non-Arab tribe, the Zaghawa, are not so lucky. They live in fear of attacks by the Janjaweed, the Sudanese government-backed Arab militia.
I’ve been confused about the political situation in the Sudan and this article actually helped clear up some of that confusion — mostly because it’s the first I’ve read that so explicitly blames the trouble there on “Arabs.” So, help me clarify something else. Why do American leftists want American troops to fight militant Muslims (the Janjaweed) in this region of Africa but then condemn the Bush Administration for fighting militant Muslims elsewhere?
BTW, searching around just now I learned that we have given nearly $3 billion (that is with a ‘b’) to Sudan and eastern Chad just since 2004. Wow, that must really put us up on the compassion meter!