September 1995, pgs. 73-74

Waging Peace

By Shawn L. Twing

U.S. Committee for Refugees Offers Bosnia Testimony

Firsthand accounts of Serb "ethnic cleansing" after the fall of the U.N. "safe areas" in Srebrenica and Zepa were presented at an Aug. 4 discussion sponsored by the United States Committee for Refugees, a private, humanitarian relief agency based in Washington, DC. USCR senior analyst Bill Frelick and Refugees International president Lionel Rosenblatt, who had just returned from interviewing Bosnian Muslim victims, related horrifying accounts of Serbian atrocities prior to, during and after the fall of the two United Nations "safe areas." The mind-numbing details left the audience drawing numerous parallels with the Holocaust.

After shelling Srebrenica and Zepa for days, the Serbs entered the towns, meeting no resistance from U.N. personnel stationed there. When they entered Zepa the Serbs detained UNPROFOR personnel, confiscated their equipment and clothing, and took U.N. vehicles for a "joyride" that killed two Muslim women. In Nazi-like fashion the Serbs separated the civilian men and boys old enough to fight from the women, children, elderly and infirm. During the first night of the Serbian occupation of Srebrenica one witness who took her young child outside to relieve himself saw scores of bodies of men who had been executed. Also, Serbs harassed the women and girls repeatedly, raping many of them, including a 14-year-old girl.

Of primary concern to the speakers was the fate of the 10,000 to 18,000 civilian men and boys who fled into the woods to escape the Serb onslaught. Initial reports by survivors who walked 60 miles to reach Bosnian government lines offered very little hope. The Serbs had prepared ambushes for the fleeing men, firing automatic weapons at them from trees, and sending in soldiers dressed as civilians to give false directions and to throw grenades into crowds. The Serbs even set up an ambush of tanks to fire at the defenseless civilians. Both Frelick and Rosenblatt feared the worst for those fleeing Srebrenica and expressed their hope that the international community would make finding the survivors and reuniting them with their families its first priority.

Senator Specter Discusses Counter-terrorism Bill On "Firing Line"

Republican presidential candidate Sen. Arlen Specter defended the Senate counter-terrorism bill against criticism from a wide range of individuals on William Buckley's nationally televised program "Firing Line." Opposing the Pennsylvania senator were Ira Glasser of the American Civil Liberties Union; syndicated columnist Anthony Lewis; Prof. David Cole of Georgetown University, who quoted James Madison at length, to illustrate that the counter-terrorism proposal undermines some basic Madisonian principles embodied in the Constitutional rights to organize for political purposes and to carry out non-criminal protests; and founder James Zogby of the Arab-American Institute, who accused drafters of the bill of anti-Arab bias.

During the two-hour debate, Senator Specter was supported by Steven Emerson, producer of the controversial documentary "Jihad in America," who as a self-described "terrorism expert" suggested prior to the arrest of Timothy McVeigh that Arabs or Muslims might have instigated the Oklahoma City bombing. William Buckley also supported the Pennsylvania senator's counter-terrorism proposal. In the end, however, even the three proponents of the bill that passed the Senate by an overwhelming 92-8 margin in the immediate aftermath of the Oklahoma City tragedy admitted that it probably will be difficult to pass in the House of Representatives in September.

Representatives of Seven Religious Faiths Protest Serb "Ethnic Cleansing"

Representatives of seven religious faiths accepted an invitation from the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum for an Aug. 3 ecumenical service to protest religious warfare and "ethnic cleansing" under way in former Yugoslavia.

The speakers included Rev. William Fay, associate general secretary, U.S. Catholic Conference; Amrit Kaur, secretary, Guru Gobind Singh Foundation Sikh Center; Dr. Abdullah M. Khouj, director, The Islamic Center, Washington, DC; the Very Rev. Myron D. Manzuk, chancellor, diocese of Washington Orthodox Church in America; the Rev. John E. Roberts, president, the Alliance of Baptists; Rabbi David Saperstein, director, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism; and Dr. K.N. Siva Subramanian, coordinator, United Hindu Temples.

Speakers representing the host organization were Dr. Walter Reich, director, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, and the Hon. Miles Lehrman, chairman, United States Holocaust Memorial Council.

Opening the service of prayer for victims of the war in former Yugoslavia, Lehrman told the assembled audience: "Those of us who 50 years ago watched in anguish as the Jewish communities of Europe were rapidly disappearing from the surface of the earth remember how deeply pained we were by the fact that the 'good and decent' world stood by idly and did nothing to stop the Nazi atrocities...We, the eyewitnesses of the horrors of a half-century ago, cannot remain silent." He said the purpose of the museum's ecumenical service was to "express our moral indignation" at the bloodshed in Bosnia.

Attending the ceremony were Ambassadors Sven Alkalaj of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ahmed El Sayed of Egypt, and Itamar Rabinovich of Israel.

Shawn L. Twing is the news editor of the Washington Report.