The Rwanda genocide, beginning in April of 1994 and ending in the same year only 100 days later, was the attempted extermination of the Tutsi ethnic group. The violence was acted out by approximately 200000 people, many of which were from the Hutu ethnic group (“Genocide in Rwanda”). Tutsi and Hutu are two of the three main ethnic groups making up the Rwandan population ("Genocide in Rwanda"). The Hutus first took action in killing all important officials who were in power to put a stop to their plan ("Genocide in Rwanda"). One of the first to go was the president at the time Habyarimana, a Hutu, the flight he was in April 6, 1994 was shot down ("Genocide in Rwanda").
With the darkest sides of humanity exposed, where would you stand? The Rwandan genocide was a mass murder that began April 6, 1994, lasting about 100 days (History.com Staff). The death toll reached 800,000 of mostly Tutsis (Fisanick 40). Struggles for governmental control had altered many times but the Hutus seized authority when the genocide commenced (Fisanick 40). The Holocaust was the persecution and massacre of European Jews, primarily led by Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party during World War II, lasting from January 30, 1933 to May 8, 1945 (“Introduction”).
They should have listened to him This was one small way that they may have able to avoid the Holocaust themselves. During the Rwandan Genocide the Tutsi knew right away. Within hours the Hutus were mass murdering their own people. The staff at History.com wrote “During this period, local officials and government-sponsored radio stations called on ordinary Rwandan civilians to murder their neighbors.” This is quite different than Elies experience during the Holocaust. The Jews were transferred from their homelands and brought to different concentration camps.
They did this to save their own lives. They would have been killed themselves if they didn’t kill who they were told to kill (Rosenberg 1). According to Factsbits, the Hutu leaders manipulated other Hutus into killing their family, friends, and acquaintances. The Rwandan conflict is genocide because thousands of people were killed, the Hutus tried to wipe out the Tutsis, and all of this was based on ... ... middle of paper ... ...da-Genocide.htm> "Rwanda, Genocide, Hutu, Tutsi, Mass Execution, Ethnic Cleansing, Massacre, Human Rights, Victim Remembrance, Education, Africa." UN News Center.
Getting rid of the Tutsis was thought of by the Akuza, Rwandan Army, The national army, Interahamwe, Impuzamugambi, and the Hutu population. It started because of the conflict between the Hutu government and the RWF. Within Rwanda, Hutu exterminist among the countries political elite, blamed the Tutsi population for the countries increasing social, economic, and political pressure. When all this was happening, war between Hutus and Tutsis broke out on October 2nd 1990, when the Tutsi rebel group RDF, invaded Rwanda from the North. All the Hutus blamed the Tutsis for supporting the Rebels.
The Genocide is costing the lives of thousands of Tutsis and some moderate Hutus. One genocide statistic appeals that “During this period of terrible slaughter, more than 6 men, women and children were murdered every minute of every hour of every day.” The genocide is also ignoring the human rights of the Tutsis especial... ... middle of paper ... ...ives of the Tutsis are just as important as American lives. What is happening in Rwanda is a Genocide; not just an “act of Genocide” as a memo to the secretary of state have stated; accordingly to “Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide”, which defines Genocide as “any…acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious groups.” The intentions of the Hutus are clear if not almost explicit to rid of the Tutsis. Therefore the U.S. must try to intervene. The United States must try to achieve world peace once again and ensure the human rights of the Tutsis using the three political instruments: sending in relief workers, sending in doctors and issuing threats.
When a planned genocide is occurring, ethnic cleansing is usually hand in hand. Ethnic cleansing is the systematic destruction of cultural heritage (Sells 1). Genocide and acts of ethnic cleansing are usually executed by an organized group of people with a clear goal: annihilation of the chosen victims. One of the most horrific genocides of all time was committed by the Nazi's against the Jews during World War II. After the Holocaust occurred, the nations of the world vowed to prevent another genocide.
This definition was placed by international governments, but the word was developed by a single man in response to the Holocaust. Grappling for a way to express the magnitude of the actions against the Jews during World War II, Raphael Lemkin decided to create a new word to embody the concept (Rusesabagina 136). “ʻGenoʼ is from greek meaning race or tribe, and ʻCideʻ is derived from latin, meaning Killing” (Choices Program 4). With the creation of the word and the definition, people began to acknowledge that genocide was wrong. During the twentieth century, nearly 170 million people were killed by governments or political violence, forty million of them in genocides(Choices Program 1).
Accusations from editorials and radio broadcasts claimed Tutsis wanted to establish a monarchy with Hutu slaves; other racial libel included all the Tutsis being called cockroaches. Many years prior to the Rwandan genocide, a similar deliberate extinction occurred. Between 1933 and 1945, members of the Nazi party killed over six million Jews in what is know now as the Holocaust. The genocide started when the Treaty of Versailles caused Germany to pay massive monetary compensations to the other nations. As stated by Sean Sheehan in Why Did the Holocaust Happen?
The European Roma were deemed racially inferior by the Nazi Regime and tens of thousands were killed during the Holocaust. Their treatment during the Holocaust is sometimes paralleled to the Jews. A common misconception is that the Nazis were originators of the hatred towards the Roma. The truth is that the Christian Church was the first to persecute the Gypsies, it spread from there to the Britons. In the 19th century some Gypsy families were herded in to a forest area of England and forced to live in horrible conditions.