Bosnian imam attacked 7 times over call to stay out of Syria

[Admiral Yi]

I remember the Croats being on the offensive, with their shiny new German artillery, can't say the same for the Bosniaks.  My recollection is they were getting their asses kicked up to Dayton.

[The Brain]

They'd reached a deal with the Croats and were very much on the offensive at the end.

Edit: See the map here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Split_Agreement#mediaviewer/File:1995_Croat_and_Bosniak_Counteroffensives.jpg

Unpossible. Glorious Serb was stronk.

[The Minsky Moment]

Well... it says that "a man" beheads the woman. Maybe Imam Viking has the Qu'ranic scholarship to say with great certitude that "the man" in question is Mohammad. I myself am no scholar of the subject, and normally would expect the Hadiths to explicitly name the Prophet and use the customary honourifics, but if Imam Viking says otherwise, who are we to doubt him?

It says something in Arabic which has been translated rather poorly so unless there is a native Arabic speaker who wants to chime in I would hesitate to speculate further.  However, according to the tradition somewhere between 500-1000 people were put to death so clearly Muhammad wasn't doing that on his own (nor was any single man).  All the other Hadith have him ordering or approving or delegating, but not doing the executions himself.

[Berkut]

I don't see how it makes any difference at all whether he swung the sword or ordered someone else to do so...why is that relevant to the question of whether or not he beheaded people? He was an important dude, so it is likely that had he wanted someone beheaded, he could simply order someone else to do it rather than do it himself.

If he neither beheaded anyone OR ordered anyone to be beheaded, than this Imam has a valid point. If he beheaded people OR ordered them to be beheaded, then he does not.

If the debate is between whether he did it himself or just had someone else do it for him, I don't see the grounds for a meaningful distinction.

[Queequeg]

Their view is that the international community imposed an arms embargo on Yugoslavia while they were being massacred. The embargo didn't affect the Croats (who got guns through money laundering in Italy and allegedly the Vatican) or the Bosnian Serbs who were supported by the Yugoslav army (then the third largest in Europe) but did massively affect the ability of Bosniak forces to fight or to defend themselves.

Eventually Turkish and Saudi money (and fighters) were able to get through the embargo. The Bosniaks were in a better position to fight back and were starting to win battles. At that point (not when they were being killed) the international community basically stepped in and imposed a peace. The peace is still very contentious because one of its sad, pragmatic effects is that some ethnic cleansing worked. The other issue of course is that Dayton was only meant to last a year or so after which a Bosnian written constitution would go forward. Obviously nothing of that sort has happened.

It rankles that Srebernica is in Srpska, for example, and the only real acknowledgement of what happened there in Srebernica is whenever the international community go to have an event. But even then I've been told on the roads in Srpska from Sarajevo to Srebernica people put pictures of Karadzic and Mladic in house and shop windows. Similarly there are towns where I know people who've dug up mass graves of Bosniaks but the only memorial in the town is to the Serb heroes who liberated it.

Obviously that's a very partial version, but that's what I've been told Bosniaks think - I've friends who've worked in the international community who've explained their view when I see them. But their view and apparently it's an opinion shared by other internationals is that it's only a matter of time before there's another civil war in Bosnia.

Edit: The description of the arms embargo reminded me of the Spanish Civil War in a way.

This is interesting, but I'm going to be perfectly frank; my perspective on Bosnian Muslims isn't especially coherent or fair.  It's one of the few weird little prejudices I have that is based on family tragedy and is therefore really unlikely to dissipate. 

[The Minsky Moment]

If he neither beheaded anyone OR ordered anyone to be beheaded, than this Imam has a valid point. If he beheaded people OR ordered them to be beheaded, then he does not.

No for the Imam to have a valid point, he just needs to show that ostentatiously murdering innocent civilians for show is not something Muhammad would approve of.  Thus all the Hadith* about the execution of there Banu Quarayza - which concern execution of prisoners of war - are not relevant at all.  It appears that Viking was making a more literal, pedantic point that in fact Muhammad did literally behead people, and in response to that point ( and that alone) it is also relevant to point out that the traditions don't seem to say that.

*The Qur'an itself does not contain that account.  Even traditionalist Muslims acknowledge that the Hadith are not 100% beyond a shadow of any doubt reliable (as the Qur'an is presumed to be).  Some more modern Muslims take an even more historically realistic view of the Hadith and view them as dubious indicators of actual historical data.  It is not clear what the views of this Bosnian Imam are on this issue.

[Warspite]

I remember the Croats being on the offensive, with their shiny new German artillery, can't say the same for the Bosniaks.  My recollection is they were getting their asses kicked up to Dayton.

The Bosniaks and Bosnian Croats (the Federation) were making significant gains in the spring and summer of 1995. I cannot remember the exact chronology but what I believe happened is that the Bosnian Serb offensive of 1995 (of which the Srebrenica atrocity was a part) comes to a halt once the Croatian army vaporises their northern flank by taking out the Croatian Serb breakaway state in late July and early August 1995. The Federation then takes the offensive and starts making substantial territorial gains, albeit with some assistance from Croatian army regulars crossing the border. As Holbrooke put, 'the map negotiation was happening on the ground'.

I have a number of Bosniak friends - people who crawled their way out of Srebrenica or lived through their apartment being mortar bombed in Sarajevo. They find it very hard to be grateful to the West for two weeks of airstrikes in 1995 because they remember the previous three years of being abandoned by the West and the three years of ineffectual diplomacy. Do not underestimate the sense of injustice they feel that despite being recognised as a UN member in May 1992, they were practically forbidden from defending themselves. This is not just lamenting the lack of foreign assistance; this is cursing active obstruction.

That said, most Bosniaks - in fact all the Bosniaks I know - despise the extremists. The beardies walking around in robes are un-Bosnian in their view, and they fear the wahhabist mosques popping up around the countryside.

[Berkut]

If he neither beheaded anyone OR ordered anyone to be beheaded, than this Imam has a valid point. If he beheaded people OR ordered them to be beheaded, then he does not.

No for the Imam to have a valid point, he just needs to show that ostentatiously murdering innocent civilians for show is not something Muhammad would approve of.

Well, yes, that is correct, and that is more his underlying point I am sure.

Because beheading someone is not even such a terrible thing for a ruler to do or have done, under legitimate circumstances. Wanton slaughter of civilians is clearly more what this is about, and certainly what they guy was talking about.

Thus all the Hadith* about the execution of there Banu Quarayza - which concern execution of prisoners of war - are not relevant at all.  It appears that Viking was making a more literal, pedantic point that in fact Muhammad did literally behead people, and in response to that point ( and that alone) it is also relevant to point out that the traditions don't seem to say that.

That is a good point.

I appreciate you letting me NOT be on the side of Viking on this issue. It was leaving a bad taste in my mouth...

[KRonn]

That said, most Bosniaks - in fact all the Bosniaks I know - despise the extremists. The beardies walking around in robes are un-Bosnian in their view, and they fear the wahhabist mosques popping up around the countryside. 

That is indeed something to worry about, as it will only cause the areas Muslims to become more radicalized. The Sauidis do this stuff all over the world, as the Wahabis are Saudi, one of the pillars of their government, and proably really only tolerated in Saudi Arabia. But in western nations people apparently don't really sense the problem and probably regard them as just another Islamic sect.

[Valmy]

Well... it says that "a man" beheads the woman. Maybe Imam Viking has the Qu'ranic scholarship to say with great certitude that "the man" in question is Mohammad. I myself am no scholar of the subject, and normally would expect the Hadiths to explicitly name the Prophet and use the customary honourifics, but if Imam Viking says otherwise, who are we to doubt him?

It says something in Arabic which has been translated rather poorly so unless there is a native Arabic speaker who wants to chime in I would hesitate to speculate further.  However, according to the tradition somewhere between 500-1000 people were put to death so clearly Muhammad wasn't doing that on his own (nor was any single man).  All the other Hadith have him ordering or approving or delegating, but not doing the executions himself.

The Hadiths are what people in the Umayyad Caliphate wanted Mohammed to have done anyway so what actually happened is unlikely to be accurately recorded by the Hadiths.  Their purpose was not really to accurately do that anyway but to define a new religion distinct from the ones of the conquered peoples.  The other problem is that until Arabic added all those nice little dots to indicate vowel sounds each word could be translated a completely different way, which is why there were so many Arabic dialects.  So what the Quran and the Hadiths say is always debatable.

[Valmy]

Yeah the arms blockade mostly just hurt the Bosniaks and it was a disastrous policy.  A huge mistake by Bush 41.  But, to be fair, the iron curtain had just fallen and we had no clue what we were dealing with.  There were all these claims that the Balkans are just full of nutcases and the best thing you can do is try to contain the violence.

[CountDeMoney]

Yeah the arms blockade mostly just hurt the Bosniaks and it was a disastrous policy.  A huge mistake by Bush 41. 

A huge mistake by everyone involved.

But, to be fair, the iron curtain had just fallen and we had no clue what we were dealing with.

Europeans knew precisely what they were dealing with, and that is why they were more than content to let the genocide occur in their own backyard.  Again.  At least Tony Blair had the conjones to stand up to it.

The whole Balkan mess of the '90s is a perfect example why NATO has to remain in place, and the United States needs to be the primary driver behind it.  You leave Europeans to their own devices, and they'll be back at their ethnocentric killing sprees again.  Balls of Light, my ass.  Fucking savages.*



*United Kingdom not included.

[The Brain]

The UK fought a world war for the cause of Greater Serbia.

[CountDeMoney]

The UK fought a world war for the cause of Greater Serbia.

The UK's war cause is still rusting at the bottom of Scapa Flow.

[Siege]

ah, ok.