The strange thing about this case is that self-proclaimed anti-jihadists who have no trouble recognizing Palestinian "Paliwood" War-Is-Deceit propaganda designed to advance the jihad cause by manufacturing Israeli atrocities, and who even recognize fauxtography generated by the Palestinians, Iran, and others for the same purpose, refuse even to consider the possibility that Muslims could have carried out any deceptive atrocity-manufacturing in the Balkans. Indeed, some even charge that anyone who thinks that Balkan Islamic jihadists carried out any deception at all must be secretly a sympathizer of this genocide-that-never-was.
But that, of course, is a common tactic of both Leftists and jihadists: if you can't refute 'em, defame 'em.
"Srebrenica: More Myth Than Massacre," by Caleb Posner, August 25:
As the saying goes, history is written by the winners. And when it comes to the former Yugoslav peoples, that can readily be described as everybody but the Serbs. So it is unsurprising then that they have been vilified throughout the West, labeled as war criminals and butchers whose unmitigated xenophobia caused the collapse of a great multi-ethnic state and the bloodiest set of wars Europe had witnessed in a half century. Yet much as Joe Biden and other Serbophobic politicians who called for the repeated bombing of Serbia during the Wars of Yugoslav Secession might believe that summary to be accurate, the facts simply do not lend themselves to such a conclusion. This may be no better demonstrated than by looking at Srebrenica, which has long been Exhibit A in the court of world opinion in the case against the Serbs.Officially, the story goes that around 8000 innocent Bosnian Muslims were, without any provocation, slaughtered indiscriminately by genocidal Serbs with revanchist aims, who were unmoved by the civilian status of their victims, or that the area they attacked was to be a safe haven managed by the unbiased and above reproach United Nations. As far as making a case for the bloody violence the Western allies would unleash on the Serbs, that did the job rather well, as it played to the sympathies of the emotionally-driven masses. Of course, with respect to capturing the truth, the governmental line is rather inadequate.
So what exactly is the truth? Alexander Dorin, a Swiss researcher who just recently sent his book “Srebrenica – The History of Salon Racism” to print in German (Serb and English translations are planned in the future) said in an interview that, “After 14 years of investigating events that took place in Srebrenica in 1995 I can attest there was no genocide over Muslims in that enclave — the myth about the massacre of Muslims was invented by the late Bosnian Muslim war leader Alija Izetbegović and then-U.S. president Bill Clinton.” Questionable as that allegation may sound to many, it is important to recall that the United States actively armed Izetbegović and his ragtag jihadist army during the war, applied pressure on Tudjman’s secessionist Croat government to cease his involvement in the Herzeg-Bosnia land theft, and sought actively to create a Bosniak state where one had not traditionally existed (for the land falls within the bounds of historic Serbia). Much of this, especially the sale of arms, was documented heavily even by the liberal American media at the time. And indeed, once the other factual inaccuracies become apparent, it seems quite evident that there was not a Srebrenica massacre, but rather a military engagement that, like many US operations, involved some inadvertant civilian casualties, that has been mythologized to give political cover to the warmongers that led us into battle on intelligence information more questionable than any ever utilized by the Bush administration.
For instance, the real number of dead bodies uncovered was closer to 2000. Some 3000 names of alleged victims were alive enough to vote in the 1996 elections. And many other dead bodies were found to be from previous gun battles or from non-violent ends more than a decade before the event in question. Still unaddressed though is guilt. Among the 2000 dead discovered were a very large number of soldiers who, under the leadership of jihadist Naser Orić killed some 3000 Serbian civilians beforehand. That raises perhaps the most important point: Srebrenica was not a purposeful slaughter of innocent civilians, but an effort by Serb forces to save the lives of their countrymen from an enemy army that had already spilled ample blood, and which was cowardly seeking refuge in protected civilian areas that were supposed to be unarmed, and therefore demilitarized....
Beautiful stuff, Mr. Spencer, I knew you would start to come around on this eventually.
The hints have been there for a while.
I think the key here is to avoid the thorny issue of the charges by croats that serbs also committed genocide against them (this would only confuse jwatchers who need an evil muslims vs the good everyone else prism to make sense of the world)
Again, the facts bear out that all sides in the Bosnian conflict committed their share of atrocities, the fault of the Serbs was that they were on the wrong side, thus the only ones demonised. The Muslims and the Croats both committed war crimes, but they were on the right side (US and NATO) and thus recast as the good guys and victims of an evil, Serbian, neo-fascist conspiracy. The Muslims and their facilitators in the West brought all the pictures of Muslims in a form meant to invoke memories of the Holocaust, while all we saw of the Serbs was assorted paramilitary units meant to remind us of the Nazis. The media never presented the vicious and sadistic mujahideen (including many friends of Osama bin Laden) beheading people and committing other brutalities.
The myth of genocide would later be picked up by the Albanian Muslims in Kosovo when the Serbian government began a legitimate crack down on KLA narco-terrorists.
Mike
"Come around on this eventually"?
You need to pay closer attention. I've never changed my position on this. Search the archives.
Re the Serbs: please note that I do not accept the contention by you and your ilk that to oppose the jihad in the Balkans constitutes an endorsement of any atrocity by the Serbs, real or imagined.
Anyone who views the world through an "evil muslims vs the good everyone else" prism is a fool. Human nature is everywhere the same. However, not all religions and human philosophies reinforce and reward violence and brutality to the same degree.
Cordially
Robert Spencer
See, for more, "Peacekeeper," a book by the commander of U.N. troops in the area, Canadian general Lewis MacKenzie.
Mr. Spencer,
How would you characterize those who dont accept the armenian genocide as a genocide? how about those who dont accept the holocaust as a holocaust?
They also have their "researchers" and their "evidence" but even questioning the armenian genocide or the holocaust is a punishable offense in certain european countries (lucky for you, not the Bosnian genocide)
You and your ilk have done you best to excuse or ignore Serb behavior during the Balkan war precisely because it happened to Muslims (ironically secular Muslims).
Mike
Holocaust denial has to be met by the facts. There is abundant evidence establish the genocide of the Jews in Europe and of the Armenians in Turkey.
The fact that some people deny both doesn't mean that everyone who asserts the existence of a genocide must ipso facto therefore be correct.
As for the Serbs, I've never excused or ignored anything. I even referred to Serb atrocities -- "real or imagined" -- above. "Real" means real. But some were indeed imagined, which does not in itself mean that all were imagined, any more than the existence of one holocaust means that all alleged "holocausts" must have really happened.
I am explaining all this to you for the sake of readers who may be confused. I have no illusions that you are operating in good faith or may be swayed by rational argumentation.
Cordially
Robert Spencer
" genocide-that-never-was."
And as evidence you present this blog and a book by Dorin.
The other evidence (such presented before the Hague) is dismissed.
I went to Mr. Dorin's website and what at surprise, he just happens to be a rather committed anti-Islam "scholar"
http://www.alexander-dorin.ch/literatur/
I read a book that presents evidence of Pyramids on Mars.
Thank you Jihadwatch for making this reference.
Always said the Serbs got a bad rap and Bill was the consummate slickster.
These Dem bastards sure love America's enemies.
Maybe its the Dem tradition of insisting, a la Kennedy, of transferring our wealth (not his) to anybody that might vote for him or them.
"There is abundant evidence establish the genocide of the Jews in Europe and of the Armenians in Turkey."
There are anti-armenian and anti-jew groups and "scholars" who contest this evidence as fabricated. Just as there small groups dedicated and anti-Muslim "scholars" who contest the Bosnian genocide.
You think its a coincidence that Robert Spencer, Hugh Fitzgerald & Co. contest the Bosnian genocide specifically?
Mike,
Oh, well, then! What he says must be false!
Cordially
Robert Spencer
Another excellent book on the Bosnian war that exposes the myth of the Srebrenica massacre is John R. Schindler's "Unholy Terror: Bosnia, Al-Qa'ida, and the Rise of Global Jihad" (see link below). Alija Izetbegovic was a master of deception and had the West in his palm while he facilitated the infiltration and training of muslim radicals and terrorist operatives. Izetbegovich knew the population of Srebrenica was vulnerable but held off providing any defense for them because he knew a massacre would provoke anti-Serbian anger in the West. Srebrenica was just one of numerous events during the course of the war that evoked sympathy from western governments and peoples and helped cement the Bosnian government sanctioned efforts to transform a once moderate muslim population into a Whahabist/Saudi extremist type of Islam, with lots of Saudi cash to build mosques, which continues today. Of course, this was helped enormously by Clinton Administration policy. With the independent Kosovars now oriented in the same direction, it's only a matter of time until we see problems coming out of the region that will be larger in scale and more threatening than just the mainly regional conflict that war was.
http://www.amazon.com/Unholy-Terror-Bosnia-Al-Qaida-Global/dp/0760330034
"Oh, well, then! What he says must be false!"
Very suspicious, like an anti-semite contesting the evidence of the holocaust or a turk nationalist contesting the armenian genocide.
Know what I mean, Mr. Spencer? Have you read the book btw?
LOL...don't little facts get in the way Mikey. Deny, deny, deny but don't ever let facts dissuade you from your cause.
Which facts are those CR? Can you direct me to some anonymous blog (perhaps something like islamisevilandtheprophetisapunk.org) where strong facts and evidence showing the bosnian genocide to be a fraud are presented?
I can send you to many sites with plenty of facts and evidence refuting the holocaust and the armenian genocide.
You know the difference CR?
The objective historical facts of the Holocaust and Armenian Genocide are irrefutable and not worth arguing with deniers. As to Yugoslavia in the 1990’s I initially thought that the Serbs were the major aggressor. It was difficult to sift and correlate the historical records but after several years of study I concluded that the Serbs were the minor aggressor and were the major victims of Muslim and Croat aggression. The latter (Muslims and Croats) deployed aggressive agitprop and disinformation targeting the Western media; the Serbs did not. Whole histories of the wars in Yugoslavia have been written in the West based on Muslim and Croat fabrications.
The unspeakable evil the Americans and the English did unto the Serb people who suffered so horribly for being loyal to them in both world wars. All to please the Muslims. I knew 10 years ago that this kind of pure evil will not go unpunished. Indeed, the 9/11 and 7/7 attacks were perpetrated by the Muslim jihadists cultivated by the US and UK in both Afghanistan and the Balkans. This is the kind of "reward" the Americans and the English got from the Muslims. Too bad, the ones who received it were not Clinton, Albright, Gore, Blair or Richardson but ordinary citizens who let them slander, scourge and crucify Serbia in their name.
Ruslan Tokhchukov, EnragedSince1999.
The U.S. under Clinton wanted to show the Muslim world at the time they would fight for them and the Serbian war as that proof.
The Clinton administration and the MSM then went into overdrive demonizing the Serbs to the point they were nothing but contemporary Nazis. Which made it very easy for the Clintons to generate support for the war and the subsequent occupation of Kosovo and its ethnic cleansing by Muslims.
That said, one thing we know for sure from that illegal conflict is that where the Muslims have power the first things they do is to drive out all non-Muslims from the region by murder and beatings.
And given the Muslim penchant for lying I would doubt anything they say about the Bosnian genocide.
I'm still also angry over my nation's actions in the former Yugoslavia which even continue today in part....The evil threat is that now the USA is being run by people who are even more wicked than the Clinton administration was.
" And given the Muslim penchant for lying I would doubt anything they say about the Bosnian genocide."
Thats the basic idea behind introducing this Taqqiya nonsense, my friend. At some point, they will be dehumanized enough (i.e. the intellectual groundwork will have been laid) for you to accept and even welcome certain "solutions" to this problem.
For example- when you read that two serbs were convicted for burning hundreds of Muslims alive (http://edition.cnn.com/2009/WORLD/europe/07/20/serbs.muslims.burned.alive/) you probably though that it was a lie and even if partially true, the serbs' anger was understandable given the evil Muslim nature.
I don't know where the truth ultimately lies respecting who is most to blame, second to blame, third to blame, least to blame, etc. for the Balkan debacle in the 1990s. That the Serbs were made the scapegoat for most all the tragedies seems pretty clear, though this in and of itself does not exonerate them.
What I do know is this and that is that until Belgrade was bombed in 1999 there was a feeling in most all of Europe that things were getting more and more out of control from 1991 onwards. There was a fear that effects would soon be felt outside the former Yugoslavia, in Hungary for instance, which was concerned about a Hungarian minority in the northern Sebia region (Vojvodina). Italy was deeply concerned about hordes of refugees. NATO was worried about fragementation within its ranks. World markets, particularly in Europe, did not take kindly to the massive instability as former Yugoslavia continiued to break down. And so on.
America wanted to stay out of the whole damn mess to begin with. The first Bush Administration said so and the Clinton Administration tried to. By 1999 America was being practically begged by Germany, France, Britain and others to do something since blue-helmeted UN troops were worthless and Russian troops looked on with cynical disregard for many involved.
And so Belgrade was bombed by America and the acute stage of the Yugoslav breakdown ended because a message was sent to everyone that enough was enough. That was what was immediately desired and that specific was achieved, though this of course didn't mean or result in no killings and depredations from that point onwards, only that such would be done with less notice and bombast, which was primarily what was desired by most in Europe.
So, after the bombing of Belgrade, unfortunate as that event was, things quieted down enough that those outside of the former Yugoslavia could breath a sigh of relief. Do I feel badly for the Serbs? I sure do. I certainly didn't support an independent Kosovo. But the Belgrade bombing served a purpose which I think has been lost sight of and it is that if you're going to have a series of wars in a country of yours that is breaking apart, never mind who is most to blame, don't do it in a manner that makes many neighbors extra nervous. Welcome to realpolitik, Metternich style. And now let the excoriation of my point of view begin.
There was a lot of propaganda flying around during the Balkans conflicts.
Do you know that one British newspaper published an account of an atrocity where Christians captured two Muslim men and forced them to bite off each other’s testicles?
The evidence? A journalist was handed, by a Muslim, an audio recording of the two men screaming.
Reflect on that for a minute: would this be sufficient evidence in a British Court to ensure a conviction? Surely not. And how easy it would be to fabricate such a piece of “evidence” as propaganda.
Incidentally, all the conflicts in the Balkans were not simply caused by Milosevic’s desire for a greater Serbia. The Bosnia War was also partly caused by President Alija Izetbegovic’s declaration that Bosnia was going to be placed under Sharia Law and that therefore the rights of non-Muslims were not going to be respected.
Also I suggest you read some of the JihadWatch archives.
Such as
Muslim Sarajevo: "Ethnic cleansing in this city has, unfortunately, been successfully completed"
http://www.jihadwatch.org/archives/022149.php#comments
The Serbs get villified because they decided to protect themselfs against the muslim barbarians led by Nasser Oric who went around raiding Serbian villages and killing Serbian civilians yet that same Nasser Oric is let off the hook by that partisan inetrnational tribunal in the hague.
Even according to the 'official' version by the U.N. the Serbs only killed the muslim men of fighting age, the women were allowed to leave. One would think that if the Serbs realy wanted to commit genocide against the muslims of srebenica they would have killed men AND women.
MP11:
Why is taqiyya "nonsense" when it is Qur'anic (3:28) and when a mainstream Islamic commentator on the Qur'an -- Ibn Kathir -- explains it as "we smile in the faces of some people, but behind their backs we curse them"?
We are, I take, not supposed to notice that Muslims say things like that, on pain of charges of "Islamophobia" and -- as you have charged here -- incitement to genocide?
Genocide is heinous and immoral -- and only you are talking about committing it in connection with any Muslims. Why don't you take your libels back to your friends at LGF?
Cordially
Robert Spencer
I'm glad you linked to this, Robert. It's excellent. I actually read it a few days ago because I know Caleb and he sent me the link.
Thank you for posting Caleb Posner's article on Alexander Dorin's book. It means a great deal to have the truth come out. Milivoje Ivanisevic examined who is actually buried in the Potocari Memorial Cemetery, which is dedicated to to the "victims of Srebrenica". It turns out that the people buried there were soldiers, many of whom had committed crimes against Serbian civilians in the region. His report is called "The Srebrenica ID Card." It is posted on several places on the Internet in a good English translation. It's easy to Google.
Also worth noting is "Ratko Mladic: Tragic Hero," which refuted charges of genocide in a ninety-page chapter called "Srebrenica: The Phantom Massacre." It's available on Amazon.com.
Two questions come to mind: 1) are Bill Clinton, Madelyn Albright, and Joe Biden, among others, prosecutable for the illegal war against Serbia, and 2) what reparations are the Serbians entitled to?
Keep up the good work! It is important to defuse Srebrenica as a Muslim grievance. The Phantom Massacre was used to recruit jihadists all over the world.
Thank you for posting Caleb Posner's article on Alexander Dorin's book. It means a great deal to have the truth come out. Milivoje Ivanisevic examined who is actually buried in the Potocari Memorial Cemetery, which is dedicated to to the "victims of Srebrenica". It turns out that the people buried there were soldiers, many of whom had committed crimes against Serbian civilians in the region. His report is called "The Srebrenica ID Card." It is posted on several places on the Internet in a good English translation. It's easy to Google.
Also worth noting is "Ratko Mladic: Tragic Hero," which refuted charges of genocide in a ninety-page chapter called "Srebrenica: The Phantom Massacre." It's available on Amazon.com.
Two questions come to mind: 1) are Bill Clinton, Madelyn Albright, and Joe Biden, among others, prosecutable for the illegal war against Serbia, and 2) what reparations are the Serbians entitled to?
Keep up the good work! It is important to defuse Srebrenica as a Muslim grievance. The Phantom Massacre was used to recruit jihadists all over the world.
Thank you for posting Caleb Posner's article on Alexander Dorin's book. It means a great deal to have the truth come out. Milivoje Ivanisevic examined who is actually buried in the Potocari Memorial Cemetery, which is dedicated to to the "victims of Srebrenica". It turns out that the people buried there were soldiers, many of whom had committed crimes against Serbian civilians in the region. His report is called "The Srebrenica ID Card." It is posted on several places on the Internet in a good English translation. It's easy to Google.
Also worth noting is "Ratko Mladic: Tragic Hero," which refuted charges of genocide in a ninety-page chapter called "Srebrenica: The Phantom Massacre." It's available on Amazon.com.
Two questions come to mind: 1) are Bill Clinton, Madelyn Albright, and Joe Biden, among others, prosecutable for the illegal war against Serbia, and 2) what reparations are the Serbians entitled to?
Keep up the good work! It is important to defuse Srebrenica as a Muslim grievance. The Phantom Massacre was used to recruit jihadists all over the world.
Thanks a lot, dear Robert, for clarifying the issues. It's about time that somebody speaks out about the actual facts. I love and admire the Serbs who fought bravely against the Nazis in WWII and hid many Jews as well. I can understand our friend Ruslan for being enraged since 1999, I felt terribly guilty towards the Serbs when the Germans attacked them for a third time in the 20th century.
In May 1999 I went to a meeting of the local green party. The greens were in a big predicament, they were in government and they were waging war something they had never wanted, but they thought the cause justified that war. There were three Kosovars at that meeting who implored the greens to deploy ground troops. Somehow the discussion shifted and got to WWII. Then one of these Kosovars said, that Hitler couldn't have been that bad, because he wanted to give them a state of their own. Deadly silence. It was one of these situations the Germans can't handle, they were totally embarrassed. The only one who spoke was me, I didn't feel embarrassed, I was as enraged as Ruslan is. Later I heard that some people agreed with me, but at that meeting nobody supported me.
"The latter (Muslims and Croats) deployed aggressive agitprop and disinformation targeting the Western media; the Serbs did not"
Not only that, the Serbs were (and remain) handicapped from the get-go: in the framework of PC MC, they are "Honorary Whites" (as are the Israelis), while the Balkan Muslims are "Honorary Browns". In this framework, the bias is overwhelmingly in favor of the latter, and against the former. The white West has come around to a place where it is predisposed to throw under the bus even fellow Europeans, if they are perceived to be "white", in order to protect the #1 Privileged "Ethnic" Group in the world today: Muslims. It was already that way in the 90s (if not the 80s and 70s and even 60s): it has only gotten worse, by a perverse logic, after 9/11. One fears it will worsen even more, to ridiculous, and tragicomic, and horrible proportions, in the decades ahead.
As I said- when this "genocide" nonsense started- 2000 or 8000 people a genocide does not make.
It is a slaughter or a massacre, at worst.
Genocide needs to be reserved for monstrous events... like the horrific Hutu-Tutsi madness in Africa.
Or what the Muslims Turks did to the Armenians.