NPR Interview: Zionists to blame for Darfur

Want to know who's responsible for the continuing genocide in Darfur? NPR listeners were given a surprising answer last night. According to Professor Horace Campbell of Syracuse University, the United States and France are responsible for its continuation. Professor Campbell went on to claim that the situation is being "manipulated" by what he calls "elements of the Zionist command", along with Christian fundamentalists and the neo-conservatives.

listen here: NPR : Africa Update: "Darfur Peace Talks"

The host of the program, Farai Chideya, didn't follow up this outrageous accusation. Was she trying to avoid being further embarrassed by the Africa expert her program's producers chose from the NPR rolodex? Was she too surprised or out of her depth to respond? I'm not certain. But I do know this: NPR, particularly the News and Notes program, owes its listeners an apology and an interview with an objective expert to undo the damage to truth done by this interview.

By the way, NPR shouldn't have been surprised by Horace Campbell's accusations against "the Zionist command" (whatever that is) because he's leveled the same charges before against "the neo-cons". According to the Spring 2007 edition of the Current, a journal published by Columbia University (read here):

Syracuse African American Studies and Political Science professor Horace Campbell says that the U.S.'s "neocon leadership" is using the perceived Arab-on-black genocide in Darfur as a means of "mobilizing a crusade against Islam" and "fighting wars in Iraq, Palestine, and Iran."

Campbell is promoting a book on Zimbabwe which purports to tell the whole story of Robert Mugabe's oppression of that country. No sane, honest person could assume Campbell is exploiting that situation for his own benefit. Revealing the horrors of the Mugabe regime, and addressing those horrors, are honorable pursuits. But somehow, when Jewish groups are involved in the campaign to end the genocide in Darfur, that indicates something nefarious, an anti-Muslim action by the Zionist high-command. (For the record, in case the reader is unaware, both sides in the Darfur conflict, both the perpetrators and the victims, are Muslim. The perpetrators identify themselves as Arab, whereas the victims are black.)

So Campbell is an expert of sorts -- an expert in applying a strategic double-standard designed to remove blame from mass murderers and place blame on those trying to end the genocide. That's the sort of expertise NPR listeners could do without.