United They Stand, United They Thrive

 

The many beautiful flowing hills, immersed in different shades of green and endowed with various crops have earned Rwanda the title, “The Land of a Thousand Hills.”

It is not, however, the natural beauty of this country where I have recently visited, to which I wish to dedicate this article. It is rather the magnificent people, this united nation of beautiful people, which have overcome one of the saddest chapters in world history, that has captured my heart and soul. It is dedicated to them

I want to pay tribute to the nation that was able to surmount, in a little over a quarter of a century, profound animosity, division, schism, bloodshed, and horrific carnage which branded its essence for far too long. It reached a crescendo in what has come to be known as the “Rwandan Genocide,” the fourth largest genocide in the history of mankind, which took place in April 1994. There were two main factors which served as precursors that fomented that heinous atrocity.

The first, the historical one, traces the roots of the conflict, as in many other places around the world, to the colonial era. Until its independence on July 1^st, 1962, Rwanda was under Belgian rule.

However, to grasp the background for the genocide that took place, one must be familiar with another factor, the demographical core of this small nation in East Africa. Rwanda is fundamentally a tribal society in its essence. It comprises of three tribes. The biggest one is the Hutu which constitutes 85% of the Rwandan population. The second is the Tutsi tribe, totaling about 14%. The third one, a relatively small one, is the Twa, which, as some claim, are the original inhabitants of Rwanda and are related to other forest tribes of Central Africa.

Though some maintain that the Tutsi tribe originated in north Africa, Ethiopia perhaps, based on physical traits that differ from that of the Hutus, culturally, there is little difference between the two.

The split between the Hutu and the Tutsi arose, initially, because of economic difference. The Hutus were farmers. The Tutsis tended livestock. They both speak the same language, intermarried, and lived amicably alongside each other for many years.

That, however, changed with the arrival of the Belgian colonial administration granted by the League of Nations mandate after World War I.

The favour shown to the Tutsis under the Belgian trusteeship between 1916-1961, “intensified the animosities between the two peoples,” (https://www.britannica.com/topic/Tutsi). The Tutsi “were given privileges and western-style education.” The Belgian, as it turned out, “used the Tutsi minority to enforce their rule.” In 1926, the Belgians even went as far as introducing a system of ethnic identity cards differentiating Hutus from Tutsis.” (https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontline/shows/rwanda/etc/cron.html). The Tutsi retained their dominant position over the Hutu, not without opposition from the latter, until 1961.

Following the Belgian withdrawal from Rwanda, chaos took over. Occasional fierce guerrilla warfare between members of the two tribe, some of which drew support from neighbouring states, continued to plague the country. It claimed both Tutsi and Hutu victims.

With an eye toward settling the sanguinary conflict, peace negotiations between the feuding parties commenced, on July 12^th, 1992, in Arusha, Tanzania. The “Arusha Accords” were signed on August 4^th, 1993.

Unfortunately, the peace agreement was short lived. On April 6^th, 1994, the plane carrying the then Rwandan president, Juvenal Habyarimana, was shot down as it was approaching the capital Kigali. The identity of the perpetrators remains a mystery. Nonetheless, both sides blamed each other.

That regrettable event was the firing shot of the "Rwandan Genocide.” Radio broadcasters fanned the flames and urged Hutus (who were physically shorter than the Tutsis) to “cut down the tall trees.”

Within one hundred days, about one million people were brutally murdered. Most of them were Tutsi.

All this was happening as the “enlightened" world stood from afar, watched and did nothing, absolutely nothing!

The incompetent U.N. Security Council issued a resolution condemning the killing while, conveniently, omitting the term “genocide.” Had the word been used, the U.N. would have been required to intervene.

Today, almost thirty years later, the nation of Rwanda, under the great leadership of President Paul Kagame, has managed, against all odds, to overcome and heal its once divided and fractured world. It stands united under the invisible yet coalescing banner which proudly proclaims, “I am neither a Hutu nor a Tutsi. I am a Rwandan!”

Shabbat Shalom