Rabbi Elliott Tepperman assists Shoa survivor Gina Lanceter, cochair of the Holocaust Council of MetroWest, with her daughter, Dena Cohen, during the candlelighting ceremony.
April 17, 2008
Some 1,000 people from across New Jersey gathered in Montclair on April 13 for the Torch Walk & Rally for Darfur, sponsored by the Essex County Coalition for Darfur. The walk raised $17,000 for Doctors Without Borders to assist their humanitarian work in the Darfur-Chad camps.
Olympic swimmer Doug Lennox and Special Olympian Emily Srebro led the march carrying a torch to draw attention to the role China can play in helping to end the genocide. At the rally that followed, speakers, including NJ Gov. Jon Corzine, urged Chinese leaders to push the Sudanese government to stop the killings and to let the approved United Nations peacekeeping troops into the country.
The Drummers, from the Montclair Academy of Dance and Laboratory of Music, lead the way during the one-mile walk from Montclair High School under the direction of Kevin Jones, right.
Rally attendees participated in a postcard campaign to the United States and Chinese governments to press for immediate deployment of these UN peacekeepers. Giving the keynote address was Sumiea Eltayeb, a Darfuri, who spoke of her experiences in Sudan. Local students, Olympic athletes, and survivors of the Holocaust and the Rwanda and Darfur genocides all lit candles for the people of Darfur as part of a vigil led by Rabbi Elliott Tepperman of Bnai Keshet, Montclair.
The Community Relations Committee coordinated with the Partnership for Jewish Learning and Life to bring Jewish teens out to the rally as part of an annual national day of community service for Jewish teens. The NJ Coalition Responds to the Crisis in Darfur was an event cosponsor.
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