Bosnian-war Quote by Peter Maass
““Bosnia's war had its visual hallmarks. Parks that were turned into cemeteries, refugee families piled onto horse-drawn carts, stop-or-die checkpoints with mines across the road. The most hideous hallmark of all was the blackened patch of ground in the center of town. It always meant the same thing, a destroyed mosque. The goal of ethnic cleansing was not simply to get rid of Muslims; it was to destroy all traces that they had ever lived in Bosnia. The goal was to kill history. If you want to do that, then you must rip out history's heart, which in the case of Bosnia's Muslim community meant the destruction of its mosques. Once that was done, you could reinvent the past in whatever distorted form you wanted, like Frankenstein. p. 85””
About This Quote
Source Book: The New York Times Magazine, “The War in Bosnia”, 1995
The quote describes how ethnic cleansing in Bosnia aimed to erase cultural memory by destroying mosques, thereby rewriting history to serve a narrative agenda.
In simple terms: Destroying mosques was a way to erase Muslim history in Bosnia.
Key Takeaway
Preserve cultural heritage to prevent historical erasure.
Themes
history
memory
cultural preservation
genocide
identity
power
Mood
somber
reflective
urgent
Type
historical
political
educational
When to use this quote
- War zones
- heritage preservation
- education
- policy making
- community rebuilding
Key Concepts
Cultural genocide
collective memory
identity politics
historical revisionism
Questions to Reflect On
- How can societies rebuild identity after cultural destruction?
- What responsibilities do international bodies have to protect cultural sites?
A Different Perspective
Even with destruction, some cultural symbols may survive or be reconstructed, complicating the narrative of total erasure.
![“That war [Bosnian war] in the early 1990s changed a lot for me. I never thought I would see, in Europe, a full-dress reprise of internment camps, the mass murder of civilians, the reinstiutution of torture and rape as acts of policy. And I didn't expect so many of my comrades to be indifferent…” quote by Christopher Hitchens](https://sms4smile.com/quotes/img-quotes/872/christopher-hitchens-117_anti-war_that-war-bosnian-war-in-the-early-1990s_3077861.jpg)