Exclusive for GIAnalytics.orghttps://gianalytics.org/952-the-islamization-of-bosnia-herzegovina-an-historical-perspective
Last November 18th 2015, an terrorist attack by the Bosnian Islamist, Enes Omeragic, in Sarajevo
killed two policemen and reminded the public that in central Europe there is a
Muslim state where fundamentalism is getting stronger: Bosnia Herzegovina, a
country which you have already applied to join the EU.
This article presents a historical overview of the
situation Islamization and fundamentalism in Bosnia.
A Little of
Bosnian History
Bosnians, Serbs and Croats are Slavic people of the
same family that arrived to the Balkans around the seventh century. They speak
the same language-the Serbo-Croat, although each country named it in a
different way: Serbian, Bosnian or Croat; Bosnian and Croats write it with
Roman alphabet, while the Serbs use the ciliric one. But there is an element
that differentiates them to oppose and confront them throughout history:
religion. They were Christianized in different ways: the Serbs were between 867 and 869 by the
Byzantine Emperor, Basil I, after that acknowledged his authority, and
therefore became Orthodox Christians; while we have the fact that in 879 Pope
John VIII recognized the Croatian sovereign, Duke Branimir, indicating that
their Christianization was held in a Roman-Catholic context.
The situation remains so until the impact of the
conquest of the Balkans by the Ottoman Empire in 1463, when Bosnia, which until
then had been part of Croatia, passed into the hands of the Ottomans and most
of its population converted to Islam, which it did not happen with the Serbs,
who maintained their religion even in the era of Ottoman rule. Croatia was
always defended from the Turkish onslaught by the Most Serene Republic of Venice
first, and then the Austro-Hungarian Empire. This is the origin of the
atavistic enmity between Croats, Serbs and Bosniaks (name given to the Bosnian
Muslim).
Geographically Bosnia and Herzegovina is divided into
two areas: Bosnia, the north of the country and Herzegovina, which owes its
name to Stefan Vukčić, who in a letter to Emperor Frederick II dated shortly
before the Turkish invasion, signed as Grand Duke of Bosnia. Duke (Herzog in
German), hence that the area was now to be known as Herzegovina (The Duchy) in
documents of the time, being formalized in the mid nineteenth century when,
even as Turkish province was officially called Bosnia-Herzegovina.
Bosnia remains under Turkish rule until 1878 (although
between 1718-1739 was taken by the Austrians), when the Bosnians rebelled
against the Sultan Abdul Hamid II, infected by the nationalist revolution of
their Serb neighbors. These revolts led to intervention in their favor by the
Austro-Hungarians and Russians eventually expel the Ottomans from Bosnia, who
happened to be administered by the Austro-Hungarian Empire; after the First
World War, Bosnia became part of a new State: Yugoslavia, which would be
divided into World War II, when Bosnia was part of the Independent State of
Croatia, and remade after 1945.
For centuries Catholics (Croats) and Orthodox (Serbs)
who lived in Bosnia Herzegovina, defined themselves as Christians, while
Muslims were called Turks, a term that is not equivalent to Osmanlis or
turkuse, referring to the actual Turks [i]
. If the Bosnian Catholics were fully identified with Croatia, and Bosnian
Serbs with Serbia, they laid the Bosnian-Muslims in the position to take Islam
as their main identifying feature.
This is how the fundamental question arises. To
substantiate the existence of a Bosnian state after the end of Yugoslavia there
were two possibilities: include Catholics, Orthodox and Muslims in only unitary
Republic (Bosnian nationalism), or take Islam as an element on which to build
their national identity leaving (Islamic nationalism) without solving the case of
the Catholic and Orthodox "minorities" and its role in a State understood
as Muslim.
Alija
Izerbegovic
Under the Titosim, Bosnia-Herzegovina was the Yugoslav
republic in which most citizens inscribed in the space reserved for
"nationality" the term Yugoslavs (without any other reference), in
the civil registry. It is during the 60s and even more sharply between the
Bosnian emigration to Germany when it starts to spread the Muslim sense of
identity among the Bosniaks, feeling that the same Tito recognized Muslims as a
"Yugoslav citizenship" in 1961, when they -due to its high rate of
natality- they became the largest group in Bosnia-Herzegovina to the detriment
of the Orthodox Serbs. This action from Tito is understood within the context
of Yugoslavia betting by integrate in so-called Non-Aligned several states of
the Muslim faith.
The beginning of the process of disintegration of
Yugoslavia with the independence of Slovenia and Croatia opened the doors to
the internal conflict in Bosnia and the possibility of creating an independent
Bosnian state. For some lit, it was time to build his Muslim state in the
Balkans, among these enlightened the most dangerous was a certain Alija
Izerbegovic who would become president of the Republic of Bosnia- Herzegovina.
Obviously this religious-national definition was the declaration of exclusion
for Serbs and Bosnian Croats of a common national project, hence their desire
and their need to "re-join" national states where they are recognized
as such. Croatia and the then Yugoslavia, respectively.
Islam and the
US supporting the Bosnian side.
Alija Izerbegovic had been part of the “Young Muslims”
organization, created under the influence of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood.
In 1970 he published a text entitled Islamic Declaration, reprinted in Sarajevo
in 1990, where it outlined its political-religious intentions: "Our
purpose: the Islamization... everything in the history of the Muslim peoples is
a memory of greatness and value has been created under the auspices of Islam.
Turkey, while Islamic country has reigned over the world, while its European
copy, represents a third-order country like many others in the world. The
Islamic movement should and can take power from the moment you have the
numerical and moral strength to do (...). The conclusion is important: there
can be no coexistence between Islamic and non-Islamic beliefs ... political and
social institutions". During the 70s and 80s to the important influence of
Egyptian Islamism in Bosnia, we must add a new even more important: Iran.
Iranian Islam was more attractive for Bosnians, Iran took advantage of this
circumstance, winning the support of future leaders of the SDA (Party of
Democratic Action, chaired by Izerbegovic), some of whom were arrested in 1983
while returning from a conference that Iran, then at war with Sada Hussein´s
Iraq, had organized in Tehran for the unity of Shiites and Sunnis.
Once the Bosnian conflict erupted, the bulk of Muslim
Bosniaks help came from Iran whose networks support - logistic and sanitary- demonstrated high
efficiency, and 86% of the Bosnian Muslims, they said to have a "favorable
or very opinion favorable "Iran. In 1992, the Muslim Brotherhood made
calls for jihad against the Serbs, although the aid was lower than Iran, with
it laying the foundations for a dangerous relationship between Bosnia and most
radical of Islamic fundamentalism.
Bosnian
fundamentalists.
United States made an appearance in the conflict in
the former Yugoslavia supporting the Muslim side and supporting the unity of
Bosnia-Herzegovina that would include Serbs and Croats under the command of
Muslims and the president Alija Izerbegovic, negating any possibility that the
Croatian minority join Croatia (traditional ally of Germany) and to do so with
Serbia (friend of Russia). Trim the advantage gained by Germany-EU with the
independence of Croatia and Slovenia, and prevent a powerful alliance of Serbia
with Russia, he made Washington took the Muslim flag (as in Kosovo would later
for the same reasons) and formalized a new entente Islamic-American against any
possible rapprochement between the two great continental powers, Germany and
Russia.
By its side, the Muslim government in Sarajevo,
advised and armed by the Pentagon, caused an irreversible situation for Croats
and Bosnian Serbs, hoping his constant provocations unleashed a wave of
violence that would allow the Muslim Bosnia have the sympathy of Western Europe
and the consequent armed intervention in their favor. As the US Secretary of
State recognized: "What at first was a multi-ethnic and legally elected
Bosnian government, it has become an extremist and anti-democratic Muslim
state." The Government of Sarajevo and its Armija (name of his army) did
not have too many scruples to get the Serbs portrayed as barbarians in the
West, and thus allow Americans lengthen the conflict with the aim to
destabilize and weaken as much as possible this area vital for the European
balance. So on May 27, 1992, an explosion in front of a bakery caused 16
Bosniaks killed, shocking and horrifying images appeared on television around
the world and were repeated ad nauseam by CNN, blaming no doubt paramilitaries
Serbs of such a creepy crime. Later the British and French secret services
recognized that it was a car-bombing of Muslims whose only purpose was to
attribute the attack to the Serbs in front of the world public opinion: this
last "detail" was not reported in world news. On August 27 the same
year, another slaughter raged a market in Sarajevo. NATO responded to the
slaughter with a great action: 60 bombers attack Serb positions. A month later,
British experts also concluded that the missile launched against the market
full of civilians came from the Muslim ranks: back the veil of media silence
spread.
Islamic
radicalism, a threat to Bosnia-Herzegovina.
"Bosnia was a model of inter-religious tolerance.
This Islam in that area was more secular than you could imagine. Muslims of
Sarajevo were so far away from the Middle East. Today, however, after ten years
of turmoil, Bosnian Muslims also have entered the international game of
fundamentalism [ii]
Between 1992
and 1995 Bosnia-Herzegovina becomes a matter of first order for international
Islamism. After 2001, research on Islamist terrorist networks always pass by
Bosnian soil. Islamists from Africa and Asia obtained with astonishing ease
Bosnian citizenship, with a clearly complicit attitude of the local
authorities, it would appear rather than the arrival of these Africans and
Asians responds to a specific will of the Muslim government in Sarajevo. This
campaign of "express nationalizations" responded to two reasons;
recognize the military merits to the Mujahideen who took up arms for the
Armija; and secondly, to allow the arrival for fundamentalist Bosnian
acquaintances that "re-islamized" the local population. This second
goal caused and still causes a degree of confrontation between the
"traditional Islam Bosnian stamp moderate" and "fundamentalist
Islam imported" by those neo Wahabi missionaries, who considered Bosnia a
territory to be "re-islamized".
That Bosnia lead by Alija Izetbegovic could not
contain the desire for self-determination of the Croatian and Serbian
communities. The war that caused this tension occupied during the early 90's
the front page of all international newspapers, Peace came with the Dayton
Agreement of 1995, according to which Bosnia-Herzegovina was divided into two
entities but always within a single state. These entities are the Federation of
Bosnia Herzegovina which includes Muslims and Croats and Republika Srpska for
the Serbs, the latter enjoys considerable autonomy and only pressures will
prevent it joining Serbia. With this division the governing body of the
Republic of Bosnia Herzegovina is collegial; two representatives of the
Federation (one Catholic and one Muslim) and a third Serb Republika Srpska, whoever
gets the most votes of those, becames the nominal president of the Republic.
From this division the Serbian area has a surface and administrative
relationship with the rest of the country, the problem is that in the Federation
witnessing a dual phenomenon, the re-Islamization in Wahhabi key Muslim
Bosniaks and marginalization and harassment of Croatian Catholics.
Desde la
salida del poder de Alija en 2000 –murió en 2003– hasta hoy los presidentes de
la Federación (le sucedió su hijo Barik Izerbegovic) han intensificado el
proceso de islamización, especialmente visible en la capital Sarajevo, antaño
conocida por la buena convivencia entre serbios, católicos y musulmanes y hoy
con un paisaje más parecido a Ankara que la ciudad europea que siempre fue. En
palabras del cardenal Franc Rodé “Sarajevo se ha convertido en una ciudad
prácticamente musulmana”, después de su viaje a la zona en junio de 2009 , el
cardenal declaró en Radio Vaticano “los católicos fueron las principales víctimas
de la guerra y muchos huyeron del país, a Croacia y también a países más
lejanos como Australia, Canadá y Nueva Zelanda (…) En Sarajevo, una ciudad de
600.000 habitantes, hoy quedan sólo 17.000 católicos”, señalando también que en
muchos pueblos donde no las había habido nunca se han construidos mezquitas,
indicando que “existe una clara voluntad de islamizar la región de Sarajevo”.
Este mismo año el cardenal de Sarajevo, Vinko Puljic, ha denunciado el
crecimiento del fundamentalismo en Bosnia, sin que las autoridades hagan nada
para detenerlos, como en muchos otros países europeos, la construcción de
mezquitas y las madrasas (escuelas coránicas) están financiadas con
petrodólares saudíes.
Since the ouster of Alija in 2000 -he died in 2003-
until today the presidents of the Federation (Alija was succeeded by his son
Barik Izerbegovic) have intensified the process of Islamization, especially
visible in the capital Sarajevo, once known for good relations between Serbs,
Muslims and Catholics and today with a landscape more like Ankara than the
European city that always was. In the words of Cardinal Franc Rode
"Sarajevo has become virtually Muslim city" after his trip to the
area in June 2009, the cardinal told Vatican Radio "Catholics were the main
victims of war and many fled the country, Croatia and more distant countries
such as Australia, Canada and New Zealand (...) in Sarajevo, a city of 600,000
inhabitants, today there are only 17,000 Catholics, "also noting that in
many towns where never had been never been any mosques, now are being built,
starting that "there is a clear desire to Islamize the region of
Sarajevo". This year the Cardinal of Sarajevo, Vinko Puljic, denounced the
growth of fundamentalism in Bosnia, but the authorities do nothing to stop
them, as in many other European countries, building mosques and madrassas
(Koranic schools) that are financed with Saudi petrodollars.
Serbs and Croats have been victims of "religious
cleansing" made with kalashnikovs and crescents, but we want to conclude
this article pointing out that the main losers are the Bosnians themselves, Muslim, but an European Slavic people,
Islamized by force by the Turkish invader in the Modern Age, and now being re-islamizated
with Saudi petrodollars and fanaticism. For them it would be necessary to
reconsider the idea of the Bosnian Muslim state as a national state. They
should be the ones that they fight Islamic fundamentalism that threatens the
identity of its people and to turn Bosnia into an Islamic logistics base in
their attack on our Europe.
Today no one should be surprised that the Salafist
preacher in Bosnia until 2013, Nusret Imamovic is number 3 of Jabhat the Nusra,
the second largest terrorist group in Syria, and that his replacement the Bosnian
fundamentalist Bilal Bosnic, is now in charge of Isis recruitment of new
members and management "donations" particularly Kuwait [iii]
Enric
Ravello.
[i] Therry
Mudry “Bosnia-Erzegovina. La nascita di una nazione” en Orion, nº5, mayo 1996.
Milan.
[ii] Aldo
dei Lello, L´utopia con la toga. L´ideologia del triunale internazionale e il
proceso Milosevic. Ed. Sovera Multimedia. Roma 2002-
[iii] Read more at: https://neupic.com/articles/atentado-en-bosnia-habra-mas
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