LOS ANGELES — John Fishel, president of the Jewish Federation Council of Greater Los Angeles, stepped to the front of a synagogue in Agoura Hills, Calif., on a recent evening and, after wishing the congregation "Shabbat Shalom," spoke of Darfur.

He told of the anguish he witnessed at a refugee camp there. Of the thousands of people he saw living in the open, under tarpaulins. Of how there's little water for drinking and none for hygiene. Of how women are often raped as they go hunting for firewood to heat the food donated by relief organizations. Of how they return to the camps beaten, bloody and shamed.

The suffering, he said, is unimaginable. Jews know what suffering is, he said. Jews must act.

It is a sentiment being repeated throughout the Jewish community as leaders ask congregations to consider the carnage in Sudan and think carefully about the words: "Never again."

What do these words mean? they ask. Do they mean that Jews vow never again to endure a genocide? Or are they also a promise that Jews will not sit by while others are systematically destroyed?

Rabbi Harold Schulweis first posed the question at Rosh Hashana to his congregation at the temple Valley Beth Shalom in Los Angeles. The killing of black Muslims in Darfur, a region in western Sudan torn by civil war, was a desecration of the phrase that strikes at the core of the Jewish soul, he told them.

What will Jews say to the children, he asked, when in response to the bitter question, "Where were the churches, the priests, the minister, the pope, during the Holocaust?" they counter with: "Where were the synagogues, the rabbis, the Jews during the slaughter of Tutsis in Rwanda and the people of Darfur?"

In the 18 months since his sermon, a Jewish movement to stop the genocide in Darfur and send aid to displaced refugees has swept Southern California. Today, 47 synagogues have joined Jewish World Watch, an organization born of Schulweis' plea. The group has raised $300,000, built two medical clinics in refugee camps, funded the digging of wells and begun raising money to provide solar cookers for a 20,000-person camp.

The cooker project is meant to see to it that women no longer have to forage for wood and make themselves vulnerable to attack.

Earlier this month, Rabbi Zoe Klein brought a solar cooker to evening services at Temple Isaiah in West Los Angeles. She had used it earlier to cook a pot of vegetable stew, and she served a taste to the cantor to show that it worked.

In Sudan, more than 180,000 people have died and an additional 2 million have been displaced from their homes since rebels rose up against the Sudanese government in 2003, citing years of oppression and discrimination. The Arab-dominated government unleashed a counterinsurgency, which eventually developed into brutal pro-government militias called the janjaweed.

Key to the growth of Jewish World Watch is its 45 trained volunteers who have fanned out through the region, giving presentations at civic groups, schools and churches. Schoolchildren also have pitched in, writing to President Bush and raising money with bake sales, car washes and the sales of wristbands that say "Do Not Stand Idly By ... Save Darfur." Jewish summer campers will be sending crayons, papers and educational toys to the children in Darfur, along with notes written in Arabic.

Anyone can volunteer with the group, and people of many ethnicities and faiths have taken part in Jewish World Watch events.

The Rev. Alexei Smith of St. Paul Melkite Greek Catholic Mission has worked with the group. "I don't know of a collective effort in this area other than that mounted by Jewish World Watch," Smith said. "And actually that's sad.

"I fear that many see this as an African problem and not as a human problem. It just hasn't resonated with people to the extent that I think it should resonate."

It has with Jews, Schulweis said.