Holocaust Memories Hover Over Refugees

Sudanese refugees who have illegally crossed the border into Israel are either forced back into Egypt or arrested and detained. Some of those arrested are released by the courts and taken in by kibbutzim, while others remain in prison waiting to be charged. The refugees pose a moral dilemma to the citizens and government of Israel; the chairman of Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust museum, wrote in a letter to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert that, “as members of the Jewish people for whom the memory of the Holocaust burns, we cannot stand by as refugees from the genocide in Darfur hammer on our doors." Israeli officials anticipate, without limits, asylum-seekers will flood the country. In court, the government has argued that those arrested are citizens of an “enemy country” that does not have diplomatic relations with Israel and where terrorist cells operate.” Yehuda Bauer, a leading Holocaust scholar, counters that German Jews fleeing the Nazis were often also classified as “enemy citizens” by Allied countries. Israeli courts largely rejected the government’s arguments, and some organizations have pledged to house the released refugees until more permanent arrangements can be made, possibly in a third country. The UN High Commission for Refugees in Israel has released a statement flatly asserting “they are not going back to Sudan.” – YaleGlobal