Srebrenica Muslims bury the dead (1 Viewer)

[tempco]

Tens of thousands of people have attended ceremonies marking the 10th anniversary of the massacre of Bosnian Muslims in Srebrenica.

...

About 8,000 men and boys were killed by Bosnian Serb forces in 1995 in Europe's worst atrocity since World War II.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4670379.stm

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one of the many massacres that tends to be forgotten. my heart and prayers go out to the families and friends of the victims of such a horrendous act of genocide.

 

[Mejc]

This tragedy should never have happened

 

[monique66]

Comrade Nathan made a post about a documentary of this on tonight...

Edit: http://www.boredofstudies.org/community/showthread.php?t=77214

 

[tempco]

oh damn, i missed it.

apparently, a documentary was aired in bosnia regarding this event. it had footage of certain killings related to what had happened, and one woman saw her son (who she had not seen for 10 years - he had left for srebrenica after the UN had declared it as a "safe zone") being shot. i can't even begin to comprehend how she must have felt at that moment.

for those who are interested: http://www.haverford.edu/relg/sells/srebrenica/srebrenica.html (more info on this tragedy)

 

[leetom]

Were the massacred Muslims of the Slavic race? Were they killed soley due to their religion or was there a bit of racial tension as well that inspired the Serb-led massacre?

I imagine any Arab remnants would exist as a result of the Ottoman Empire.

 

[azzie]

Were the massacred Muslims of the Slavic race? Were they killed soley due to their religion or was there a bit of racial tension as well that inspired the Serb-led massacre?

I imagine any Arab remnants would exist as a result of the Ottoman Empire.

in bosnia, originally there were us croats, and serbs. then when the ottoman empire ruled that area, they brought in the muslim religion, creating a new group of people- so we had the croat-bosnians, serb-bosnians and muslim-bosnians.
why it happened?- it was war. why did hundreds of croats get slaughtered by serbs? why did serbs get slaughtered by muslims? why did croats slaughter serbs?
it makes no sense.
its just war.

 

[tempco]

Were the massacred Muslims of the Slavic race? Were they killed soley due to their religion or was there a bit of racial tension as well that inspired the Serb-led massacre?

yes, they were bosnians. as for motivation, they were killed by the bosnian serbs because they were bosnian muslims.

By seeking to eliminate a part of the Bosnian Muslims, the Bosnian Serb forces committed genocide. They targeted for extinction the forty thousand Bosnian Muslims living in Srebrenica, a group which was emblematic of the Bosnian Muslims in general. They stripped all the male Muslim prisoners, military and civilian, elderly and young, of their personal belongings and identification, and deliberately and methodically killed them solely on the basis of their identity. The Bosnian Serb forces were aware, when they embarked on this genocidal venture, that the harm they caused would continue to plague the Bosnian Muslims. The Appeals Chamber states unequivocally that the law condemns, in appropriate terms, the deep and lasting injury inflicted, and calls the massacre at Srebrenica by its proper name: genocide. Those responsible will bear this stigma, and it will serve as a warning to those who may in future contemplate the commission of such a heinous act.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Srebrenica_Massacre

 

[azzie]

yes, they were bosnians. as for motivation, they were killed by the bosnian serbs because they were bosnian muslims.

lol.... you are oversimplifying this to the extreme
can you tell me exactly why these muslims and not to the same scale in other places in bosnia?
its not that easy to draw a conclusion- after all only the males were killed, if it was about religion why not kill women too?

from experiencing this war for the first 5 years of my life, i can tell you from the stuff i saw and experienced, its just not that simple.

 

[tempco]

lol.... you are oversimplifying this to the extreme
can you tell me exactly why these muslims and not to the same scale in other places in bosnia?
its not that easy to draw a conclusion- after all only the males were killed, if it was about religion why not kill women too?

from experiencing this war for the first 5 years of my life, i can tell you from the stuff i saw and experienced, its just not that simple.

i'm not talking about the war as a whole. i'm talking about this event. and as for the conclusion, i'm restating what the court ruled regarding this event. obviously, i don't have the knowledge to judge what had happened. please don't make wild assumptions.

In Prosecutor v. Krstić the Appeals Chamber of the International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia unanimously ruled that the massacre was an act of genocide:

this is in reference to what i had quoted in my previous post.

 

[azzie]

i'm not talking about the war as a whole. i'm talking about this event. and as for the conclusion, i'm restating what the court ruled regarding this event. obviously, i don't have the knowledge to judge what had happened. please don't make wild assumptions.

i wasn't aware i was making any wild assumptions at all...
what im saying is: you've said that they were killed for their religion, and you have gotten this from the rulings of the court. what im saying is that you cannot simply take this reason and apply it to the event when there were many other reasons which contributed to this event.
the crisis at srebrenica began long before the men were separated from their wives and killed. all im saying is that you might need to scratch the surface of the issue before you make sweeping statements about its causes.

 

[zahid]

oh damn, i missed it.

apparently, a documentary was aired in bosnia regarding this event. it had footage of certain killings related to what had happened, and one woman saw her son (who she had not seen for 10 years - he had left for srebrenica after the UN had declared it as a "safe zone") being shot. i can't even begin to comprehend how she must have felt at that moment.

for those who are interested: http://www.haverford.edu/relg/sells/srebrenica/srebrenica.html (more info on this tragedy)

i recorded it....ill rip it if you want

 

[mr EaZy]

thanks crash! appreciate it

Were the massacred Muslims of the Slavic race? Were they killed soley due to their religion or was there a bit of racial tension as well that inspired the Serb-led massacre?

I imagine any Arab remnants would exist as a result of the Ottoman Empire.

1) by slav- i guess u mean, did their last names end with "ovich" or "slav"
well some do.

2) it was both a matter of religon and ethnic cleansing. The serbs call the albanians "muslims" they inherited this when their ancestors called the ottomans "muslims". but thats my way to explain it. i reckon the serbs need more common sense than to attribute the rule of the ottomans to the rule of the Albanians. in the doc: the serbs said on loudspeaker: "we endured 500 years of Ottoman rule". Yet we find in Serbia chruches that are centuries old, and had the turks wanted they too could have committed genocide and wipe every serb out without worrying about the UN at the time.

BUT THEY DIDNT! AND whatever they did, it doesnt warrant genocide in the modern era in any shape or form. they said "genocide was inevitable" - yeah right!


3) Ottomans werent Arabs- they were Turks and no... there werent any arabs there. i can only imagine people of Arab descent who had migrated to the region there- just as we have people of arab descent but in China.

 

[mr EaZy]

from the documentary, i sense that the Dutch couldnt even be bothered defending the bosnian. i saw a few rude remarks made by a couple them towards Bosnians on the walls of the UN base.

like why defend them in the first place? why not just tell them "we couldnt care less about you!" and make them run off- instead of concentrating them in one area ready for the kill! when it comes to global security or the defense of human rights, im not gonna count on the UN for anything (Darfur, Niger, Israel etc: same thing!)

 

[mzTIQ]

far out its bull shit like dis which makes da world seem like hell. people killn each other jus cauz of religion.

we need 2 come 2 gether whether were muslim, christian or hindo....etc

not bury each other alive..

ps dey were definitely buried cauz dey wer muslim, therefore religious hatred definitely resulted in dis terrible ordeal...

 

[mr EaZy]

on the other hand its not about religious hatred, just religious discrimination perhaps and lack of understanding.

one author reflects here on assimilation and hatred and uses bosnia as a model for assimilation: i cut out a piece below


http://ihsan-net.blogspot.com/2005/07/on-assimilation-hatred.html

...Why should I think of assimilation and Srebrenica together? The people of Srebrenica were largely Muslim. But they had the same coloured skin and hair and eyes as their Christian neighbours. They intermarried with Christians and Jews and other denominations. They were not exceptionally observant and followed mainstream Bosnian values. Many openly drank, bought and sold alcohol.

Some 40% of Bosnian children are born into interfaith families, where parents are of different faiths. If anyone could teach Muslim Australians something about assimilation, it would be Muslim Bosnians.

But did this assimilation stop the massacre? Did it stop Serbian troops from executing their neighbours and their relatives? Did it stop teenage Serbs from killing their former school teachers?

The slaughters in Srebrenica were repeated in other cities, including the capital Sarajevo. The central square of this beautiful city hosted 4 houses of worship – the Great Synagogue of Sarajevo, an Orthodox Cathedral, a Catholic Cathedral and the Gazi Husrev Baig Mosque. Bosnians of all faiths would visit each other’s churches and mosques and synagogues.

It was this spirit of love between faiths that led to Sarajevo being awarded the winter Olympics. This same spirit led to Sydney winning the Olympics in 2000. When Muslim Australians invited IOC delegates from Muslim countries and refused to let them leave until they pledged on the Quran that they would vote for Sydney, it was clear that the Sydney spirit was alive and well. And that same spirit was reflected in the words of London’s Mayor Ken Livingstone during speeches before and after the bombing.

Terrorists are opposed to this spirit of togetherness and understanding. Terrorists want us to turn against each other. Terrorists are determined to hate. And what drives terrorists into fits of rage is when they see Muslims and Jews and Christians and Hindus and Buddhists and people of other faiths and no faith in particular living side by side in peace and harmony.

Real understanding and peace can exist whether people assimilate or not. But it won’t happen in an environment where people are determined to hate. Because the real source of terrorism is not religion. The real source of terrorism is hatred.

Religions teach us to love. In the Jewish tradition, Rabbi Hillel spoke of love for others when he asked his students: “If I am not for myself, who is for me? If I care only for myself, who am I?”. In the Christian tradition, St Paul said that love was even greater than faith and hope. And the Islamic traditions are filled with references to love for God’s creation, from Qur’anic verses and sayings of the Prophet to ecstatic poems of Rumi and other Muslim saints.

Assimilation is not enough to defeat determined hate. Minority and majority faith communities can assimilate all they like. The only thing that will defeat extremists is the divine force of love. And this love is not the empty drug-induced idealism of hippy songs. This love is built on knowledge and understanding and recognition that we are all different. And that the things that unite us are more important than those which divide us.

(The author is a Sydney industrial lawyer.)

 

[azzie]

You would have noticed on some of the graffiti:

UN - United Nothing

^^

just to clear up the fact that.... the ottomans brought muslimanity (i dont know if this is how you say it, im thinking lopsided today, most of the stuff im saying is coming out in croatian) to the reigon.... i have bosnian-muslim friends who i talk to about these things. yes they have their own church but initially it was brought by the turks to that reigon.

to add to the UN stuff, where i lived, we saw UN troops coming into the village (to "monitor the situation") and christened them "the smurfs" for their blue beretts. needless to say, they didnt do much.

as for why the people there were slaughtered, it wasnt because they were simply muslim. and please dont give me the bullshit that the serbs were to wholely blame for the war, im a croat and as much as i find it tough to say we did wrong, we did, at times. and so did the muslims. and so did the serbs.
trust me, ive seen things that nobody has ever reported. war is war. its how it goes.
srebrenica is a pin-prick in a war which saw thousands of innocents being killed for no reason.

 

[azzie]

I didn't say wholely. (actually, i take that back. All of the ex-Yu countries declared independance because they didn't want to take $hit from Serbia anymore).

Anyway, I implied that your statement is bringing about a Western approach to the situation, that all sides were equally at fault and now they should kiss and make up.

It's very clear, overall, who the aggressors were and who the victims were.

PS. Correct term for you to use is actually Bosniaks.

ive had family and friends senselessly killed. twice ive seen people killed in front of me, and thats something that will haunt me forever. what i see is that all of us were fucked up- blinders were applied to the general population who even now cannot meet at a soccer game without thinking that we have always hated each other and that serbs and croats are enemies when we lived for centuries in peace.
i dont delude myself under the pretense that i believe there will ever be peace between croats, serbs and bosnians- not in my lifetime. but i know enough of how it is, and that if you begin to point the finger of blame at any nation in the whole, messy, bloody conflict, you do not achieve anything.
it is interesting how the media war that was created by these balkan wars has infiltrated western society such that most people recognise croatia and bosnia were the victims.
what im saying is, as someone who was there, as someone who knows the whole story- its not that simple

 

[azzie]

I didn't say wholely. (actually, i take that back. All of the ex-Yu countries declared independance because they didn't want to take $hit from Serbia anymore).

Anyway, I implied that your statement is bringing about a Western approach to the situation, that all sides were equally at fault and now they should kiss and make up.

It's very clear, overall, who the aggressors were and who the victims were.

PS. Correct term for you to use is actually Bosniaks.

correct term is "Bosnianci", for Croatians, "Hrvati" and for serbs "Srbi", but it really doesnt matter what you call "us"
as for the shit we were apparently taking from serbia, could you please expand on this? i can think of two things which you might mean, and they are only really relevant for slovenia, being:
1. serbia had low levels of income compared to the wider yugoslavia. its poor industrialisation and lack of tourist inflow saw slovenia and croatia much richer, and money was being drained out of these nations to fund serbia (might i add, croatia only suffered from this a little. slovenia had the main frustrations, and they left Yugoslavia with extrodinary little conflict)
2. serb nationalism was taking over yugoslavia.
id like to point out that people who take this view do not fully understand the fact that nationalism was brewing in all of the yugoslav nations at the time. this was not something new. yugoslavia fell appart because we did not have a ruler like Tito who could unite us. each nation is equally to blame here.

 

[azzie]

i have been researching this for my history extension project
i have been reading about this since i was in year 6
my whole family except my parents are over there- i discuss these things with them all the time
i know a lot more than you think i know.

 

[tempco]

lol.... you are oversimplifying this to the extreme

i did not simplify anything. i stated what i had understood from the court ruling.

you've said that they were killed for their religion, and you have gotten this from the rulings of the court. what im saying is that you cannot simply take this reason and apply it to the event when there were many other reasons which contributed to this event.
the crisis at srebrenica began long before the men were separated from their wives and killed. all im saying is that you might need to scratch the surface of the issue before you make sweeping statements about its causes.

so, in your opinion, the court (which is responsible for administering punishment to those who deserve it - no light responsibility) did not take into account other reasons that may have contributed to this event? you are also implying that the court did nothing more than "scratch the surface" of the issue, and that the court's "sweeping statement" was not representative of the "true" cause of this event.

ive had family and friends senselessly killed. twice ive seen people killed in front of me, and thats something that will haunt me forever.

...

what im saying is, as someone who was there, as someone who knows the whole story- its not that simple

...

i have been researching this for my history extension project
i have been reading about this since i was in year 6
my whole family except my parents are over there- i discuss these things with them all the time
i know a lot more than you think i know.

i respect and recognise what you and your family has been through. unfortunately, this happens on a daily basis around the world. yes, you were there, and you have done some research for your history extension project and may know a lot more than the majority of the people on bos, but you do not know the whole story.

again, my prayers and condolences go out to those who have suffered because of this tragedy.