Connect with us

Genocide: A Day To Stand Against Denial, And Be Aware Of How Its Seeds Are Planted

Published

on

Genocide comes in many forms. From the calculated attacks on Bosnian Muslims and Croats two decades ago, to calls for rounding up gays and lesbians today, it’s important to remember the past to prevent it from repeating.

Many in the LGBT community, which this blog focuses on everyday, have witnessed an increasing level of hate speech and attacks on our community that seems to be escalating. An illustrative example, was a southern minister, while preaching to his congregation, called for rounding up and detaining gays and lesbians in a pen and suggested dropping food into the pen to feed them– is such an overt act of hatred–there are no words to describe. But this is how genocide begins, as societies break down and politicians refuse to protect or worse yet, become perpetrators of violence and hatred themselves.

This is why we must stand in solidarity with others, as they come under attack. As a member of humanity, we must extend ourselves, and by doing so, we lift all of humanity up with dignity and decency.

Twenty years ago yesterday, the Bosnian Serb authorities in Prijedor, a town in north western Bosnia and Herzegovina, issued a decree for all non-Serbs to mark their houses with white flags or sheets and to wear a white armband if they were to leave their houses. This was the first day of a campaign of extermination that resulted in executions, concentration camps, mass rapes and the ultimate removal of more than 94 percent of Bosnian Muslims and Bosnian Croats from the territory of the Prijedor municipality.

This was the first time since the 1939 Nazi decree for Polish Jews to wear white armbands with the blue Star of David that members of an ethnic or religious group were to be marked for extermination in this way.

Prijedor became a notorious location for some of the most brutal acts of torture, enslavement and rape that occurred during the Bosnian War.

The crimes of the Omarska concentration camp  in Prijedor are well known to the world–first reported by then Newsday European correspondent Roy Gutman, who earned the 1993 Pulitzer Prize for his stories on the Bosnian war.  The prisoners were beaten, starved, tortured and many died in captivity, while a rape camp of women was included within Omarska. Jadranka Cigelj and Nusreta Sivac, survivors of the rape camp went on to document hundreds of rapes of women, submitted the witness statements to the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia in the Hague that led to prosecutions of rape as a war crime.  It is believed that 20,000 to 50,ooo women were raped during the Bosnian war.

In honoring the loss of that terrible day of reckoning, Refik Hodzic, the communications director at the International Center for Transitional Justice, based in New York City, organized a day to Stop Genocide Denial after several friends from Prijedor, Hodzic’s home town, came together to organize a memorial service to those who died at Omarska during the war. But they had one little problem–they had to speak to Mayor Marko Pavic, a Bosnian Serb and a notorious genocide denier who said in 2009 that “Muslims are lying and accusing without proof” for crimes in Omarska and that those who “smear Prijedor’s name should not be looking for employment here.”

Despite their well founded fears, they approached Pavic to discuss the possibility of holding a commemoration on the 20th anniversary of Prijedor’s ethnic cleansing. Not surprisingly, Pavic told them  that as long as he was mayor, under no uncertain terms would he permit a “genocide” commemoration to those who died. Hodzic told me that after the meeting with Pavic, his friends became very, very frightened and given the history of such terrible events there, I could completely understand why people would be afraid. So what to do?

Hodzic called up his friend Azra Selak, a resident of Denver, Colorado and a beautifully talented Sevdah singer, also from Prijedor, along with his brother Emir Hodzic (who designed the website).  Together, they strategized and came up with the plan of a global campaign, declaring May 31st a “World Wide White Armband Day” to protect their family and friends who remain in Prijedor and bring attention to the continued lies about what happened during the war.

With the assistance of the Youth Initiatives in Human Rights organization in Sarajevo, and other civil society leaders throughout the region, like the Belgrade based Women in Black, the Hozic brothers and Azra, launched the campaign on multiple platforms using the web, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube. People were urged to  join thee campaign by wearing a white arm band or hanging a white sheet in their window.

Azra composed a song of tribute to her Prijedor home–a traditional Bosnian song, delivered it the style known as “Sevdah,” which is considered an expression of the soul. Azra says, “Sevdah is what carries us, people from the former Yugoslavia–immigrants, refugees, former soldiers of many armies, former prisoners of war, prisoners of our memories…there is a sense of not belonging and of permanent and unspeakable loss…”  This song and its moving music will take you to a different place of existence.

Throughout the day, with participants  from 69 countries generating more than 30,000 hits on the campaign’s Facebook page alone, thousands of people took self portraits or groups shots and sent them to Refik, who posted and tweeted them throughout the day. Many of these photographs, posted on the campaign’s Facebook page are so moving, that they brought me to tears. The humanity, solidarity and the dignity expressed  in these photographs, many in black and white, reflect a palpable and unprecedented hope–something I have not seen or witnessed in the 20 years I have had the honor to work on the consequences of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the broader region of the former Yugoslavia. The day ended in the United States from Chicago where the Bosnian national soccer team played Mexico that witnessed the unfurling of a banner that read “Stop Genocide Denial in Bosnia and Herzegovina.”

According to Refik, photographs are still coming in from all over the world. A few I would like to share:

 

Ivana, D.C.

 

Women in Black, Belgrade

Admira, city unknown

 

 

History is replete with terrible pogroms, the casting out of “others.” We are all too familiar with hatred and being cast out from our families of origin, fired from our jobs, refused housing–this happens to many of us in the LGBT community. So as a human being, I can not help but be moved by the fate of the Bosnian Muslims and Croats and in some cases Serbs too, but  join in solidarity with them they take up this courageous fight to shed light on the genocide deniers in their communities, beginning in Prijedor. These are the children of war, who may remember the war or not, but know why they no longer live in Bosnia–or for those who remain, must daily confront  the consequences of war.

But most importantly, these young people are the future of hope, their actions of taking a stand to stop genocide denial creates an opening  that embraces possibility and  the return of optimism by revealing the ugly truth. May it be so.

It is important that we stand with them because as Martin Niemoller once wrote:

First they came for the communists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a communist.

Then they came for the trade unionists,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a trade unionist.

Then they came for the Jews,
and I didn’t speak out because I wasn’t a Jew.

Then they came for me
and there was no one left to speak out for me.

Related:

Genocide? Pastor Says Kill All ‘Queers And Homosexuals’ By Airlifting Into Electric Pen

Kansas Pastor Wants Government To Kill All The Gays, Angry It Won’t

Pastor ‘Kind Of Likes’ The Idea Of Killing All The ‘Wicked’ Gays (Audio)

 

Images of the map of Bosnia and Herzegovina, courtesy of the CIA Factbook.  Images of the individuals and the Bosnia-Mexico soccer match were provided by the Stop Genocide Denial Campaign. The Niemoller poem is courtesy of Wikipedia.

 

Tanya L. Domi is an Adjunct Assistant Professor of International and Public Affairs at Columbia University who teaches about human rights in East Central Europe and the former Yugoslavia.  She is a Harriman Institute affiliated faculty member. Prior to teaching at Columbia, Domi was a nationally recognized LGBT civil rights activist who worked for the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force during the campaign to lift the military ban in the early 1990s. Domi also worked internationally in a dozen countries for more than a decade on issues related to democratic transitional development, including political and media development, human rights, gender issues, sex trafficking, and media freedom.  She is currently writing a book about the emerging LGBT human rights movement in the Western Balkans.

Related Topics:
Continue Reading
Click to comment
 
 

Enjoy this piece?

… then let us make a small request. The New Civil Rights Movement depends on readers like you to meet our ongoing expenses and continue producing quality progressive journalism. Three Silicon Valley giants consume 70 percent of all online advertising dollars, so we need your help to continue doing what we do.

NCRM is independent. You won’t find mainstream media bias here. From unflinching coverage of religious extremism, to spotlighting efforts to roll back our rights, NCRM continues to speak truth to power. America needs independent voices like NCRM to be sure no one is forgotten.

Every reader contribution, whatever the amount, makes a tremendous difference. Help ensure NCRM remains independent long into the future. Support progressive journalism with a one-time contribution to NCRM, or click here to become a subscriber. Thank you. Click here to donate by check.

News

‘Paved Paradise and Put Up a Parking Lot’: Critics Fume Over Trump’s Rose Garden Revamp

Published

2 days ago

on

June 20, 2025

By

First Lady Melania Trump’s renovation of Jackie Kennedy’s iconic Rose Garden during Donald Trump’s first term drew widespread criticism. Now, President Trump is renovating that space once again—this time transforming it into a Mar-a-Lago-style patio—sparking a fresh wave of backlash from critics.

President Trump defended what Newsweek described as “bulldozing” part of the Rose Garden, saying the change was intended to make the space more accessible for women wearing high heels, according to The Daily Beast. The renovations also involve removing several trees, including a saucer magnolia reportedly planted to honor President John F. Kennedy.

“It’s supposed to have events,” Trump said of the Rose Garden. “Every event you have it’s soaking wet,” he complained.

“The women with the high heels, it’s just too much… the grass, it doesn’t work. We use it for press conferences. It doesn’t work.”

READ MORE: Trump Starts Weekend Early After Griping Workers Get Too Many Days Off

The White House has done little to inform the American people about the construction, leaving critics to ask questions including who is paying for the construction, and is there a federal agency or commission that approves changes to the White House, given its centuries-long history.

“The White House is a national symbol and not the personal property of any president. Permanent changes should be reviewed by preservation experts and consider public sentiment, not be made unilaterally for vanity or political messaging,” wrote Molly Ploofkins, a social media user whose bio says she is a retired Army medic.

“We’ve got money to bulldoze the White House Rose Garden and turn it into a Mar-a-Lago-style patio, but we can’t pay for cancer research for kids or make sure veterans aren’t living off food stamps,” remarked Democratic strategist and former Harris senior advisor Mike Nellis.

READ MORE: ‘People Will Die’: Shock Over Trump Shutting Down LGBTQ Youth Suicide Hotline Is Growing

“I love how people keep pointing out that private donations paid for it—not the government. I don’t give a s—,” Nellis added later. “The issue is this administration’s priorities. Trump thinks it’s fine to bulldoze the Rose Garden to build a patio so he can relax outside, while doing nothing to improve your life. That’s the criticism. He’s enriching himself, screwing everyone else, and not lifting a goddamn finger to help you. That’s the problem.”

Journalist Jane Coaston remarked, “I am increasingly of the view that Trump wants to ‘be president’ so he can watch musicals and manage the rose garden and he just lets other people be co-president for periods of time so he has more time for musicals and rose garden management.”

“RIP to the White House Rose Garden,” observed former Obama White House photographer Pete Souza. “Today the Rose Garden is being ripped apart as construction begins to pave over the entire grass area. A sad, and unnecessary, day for what used to be the People’s House.”

“The White House rose garden was established in 1913,” noted WAMU’s Esther Ciammachilli, before lamenting, “Trump has just paved paradise and put up a parking lot. This is not his house. It belongs to the American people. He is just a tenant. Nothing is sacred anymore.”

READ MORE: ‘Make Asbestos Great Again?’: Trump Slammed for Move to End Ban on Russia-Tied Carcinogen

Image via Reuters

 

 

 

Continue Reading

COMMENTARY

Trump Starts Weekend Early After Griping Workers Get Too Many Days Off

Published

2 days ago

on

June 20, 2025

By

After stalling on a decision in the escalating Middle East crisis and delaying action—some say potentially in defiance of federal law—on the congressionally mandated TikTok ban, President Donald Trump, facing sliding poll numbers, a widely criticized budget bill on the brink of collapse, a looming debt ceiling showdown, and apparent tensions with his Director of National Intelligence, is heading to his Bedminster golf resort for a MAGA dinner and an early weekend likely to include several rounds of golf.

The decision to leave the White House early on Friday comes after he left the G7 early this week, reportedly to make a decision on whether or how to help Israel attack Iran. His former chief strategist, Steve Bannon, jokingly said Trump exited the conference with top world leaders because he was “bored,” The Hill reported.

The President is slated to exit the White House at 2 PM Friday.

READ MORE: ‘People Will Die’: Shock Over Trump Shutting Down LGBTQ Youth Suicide Hotline Is Growing

“With the world on edge, the president’s early departure underscores a pattern critics say reflects misplaced priorities, favoring fundraising and familiar retreats over the day-to-day demands of governance,” MeidasTouch News reported.

The long weekend also comes just hours after President Trump denounced “too many days off” for federal and other workers, a remark he made on Juneteenth, a federal holiday signed into law by President Joe Biden in 2021. Trump had campaigned on passing the legislation to honor and celebrate the day that symbolizes the end of slavery, but made no mention of it this year.

“Too many non-working holidays in America,” Trump decried Thursday evening.

“I know this is a federal holiday.” White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt told reporters on Thursday. “I want to thank all of you for showing up to work. We are certainly here. We’re working 24/7 right now.”

This week, in addition to meeting with his national security team, and an “awkward” meeting with players of the Juventus soccer team, Trump presided over the installation of two 88-foot flag poles and the raising of massive American flags at the White House.

READ MORE: ‘Make Asbestos Great Again?’: Trump Slammed for Move to End Ban on Russia-Tied Carcinogen

Trump’s long weekend also comes just one week after millions protested his policies across all 50 states and internationally on Saturday, while he attended a military parade celebrating his and the U.S. Army’s birthdays, and after a tragic political assassination of a Democratic lawmaker and her spouse.

It also comes one week after Trump appeared to make a major about-face, saying farm, hotel, and restaurant workers are valuable and extremely difficult to replace. He suggested that ICE would pause targeting those workers, only to turn around just days later to announce “the largest mass deportation program in history.” The pause on deportations was canceled, leading one notable political commentator and legal analyst, Joyce Vance, to wonder if Trump is actually in charge.

“Who’s running the show?” she asked, suggesting someone may have “countermanded” him on the deportations. “Who’s in charge? Trump or someone else?”

READ MORE: Trump Appears to Confuse America’s Revolutionary War With the Civil War

 

Image via Reuters

Continue Reading

News

‘Actively Trying to Erase Black History’: Trump Berated for Juneteenth Remark

Published

2 days ago

on

June 20, 2025

By

President Donald Trump, who campaigned in 2020 on making Juneteenth a federal holiday, used the occasion this year to criticize the number of federal holidays—a comment many viewed as a direct slight against Juneteenth, which marks the symbolic end of slavery in the United States. He did not issue a presidential proclamation recognizing the holiday.

It was President Joe Biden who signed the legislation making Juneteenth a federal holiday in 2021. And while he is no longer in office, it was Biden—not Trump—who formally honored and celebrated Juneteenth.

On Thursday, President Biden “took part in the service at the Reedy Chapel AME Church,” in Galveston, “one of the locations where an order announcing the end of slavery in Texas was read on June 19, 1865, two years after President Abraham Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation,” CBS News reported. Biden criticized “ongoing efforts to erase history” during the event, “and appeared to take a shot at his successor, President Trump.”

READ MORE: ‘People Will Die’: Shock Over Trump Shutting Down LGBTQ Youth Suicide Hotline Is Growing

President Biden said, “Still today, some say to me and you that this doesn’t deserve to be a federal holiday. They don’t want to remember…the moral stain of slavery.”

“Our federal holidays say … who we are as Americans,” Biden also said Thursday, as CNN reported. “What we celebrate says what we value.”

At least twice, Biden appeared to refer to Trump, although not by name.

“When speaking about attempts to erase history, he referenced ‘this guy’ before giving himself the sign of the cross — drawing laughter from the audience,” CBS noted. “At another point, Biden pointed to efforts during his administration to rename military bases named after Confederate military officers, a process mandated by Congress.”

Also on Juneteenth, President Donald Trump launched an angry missive at the number of federal holidays, although he did not mention Juneteenth specifically.

READ MORE: ‘Make Asbestos Great Again?’: Trump Slammed for Move to End Ban on Russia-Tied Carcinogen

“Too many non-working holidays in America,” Trump declared. “It is costing our Country $BILLIONS OF DOLLARS to keep all of these businesses closed. The workers don’t want it either! Soon we’ll end up having a holiday for every once working day of the year. It must change if we are going to, MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”

While shuttering the federal government while paying workers does cost money, Trump offered no evidence to support his claim that workers don’t want the day off.

Critics berated President Trump.

“Saying there are ‘too many non-working holidays’ on Juneteenth is so on brand for a man who is actively trying to erase Black history,” wrote U.S. Rep. Jasmine Crockett (D-TX). “This from the same man who’s wasted over $26 million in taxpayer dollars and spent more than 30 days golfing since January 20, 2025? Please.”

“As Americans celebrate Juneteenth,” U.S. Senator Patty Murray (D-WA) wrote, “I want to say: Trump can try to erase whatever history he doesn’t like, and he can try to brand ‘diversity’ as something bad. But he won’t succeed. We’ll remember ALL of our history and affirm that diversity is our strength here in America.”

“Not only is he trying to make you work MORE but also he’s taking an apparent dig at Juneteenth. This is coming from the same guy who golfs every weekend. Pathetic,” declared political commentator Harry Sisson.

RELATED: Hegseth Sidelines Juneteenth and Its Military History

 

Image via Reuters

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2020 AlterNet Media.