Jew challenges Bosnia presidency ban (No Jews allowed for running for presidency of Bosnia)

http://www.b92.net/eng/news/globe-article.php?yyyy=2007&mm=02&dd=19&nav_category=123&nav_id=39700 ^

[kronos77]

Jakob Finci, the leader of Sarajevo's small Jewish community, has asked the European Court of Human Rights to lift the prohibition on Jews and other minorities running for the Bosnian presidency.

Under the country's post-war constitution, only Bosnian Serbs and Croats, who are overwhelmingly Catholic and Christian Orthodox, respectively, and Bosniaks, who are Muslim, are allowed to run for presidency. Bosnia has three presidents, each representing one of Bosnia's principal constituent groups.

"We understand that Mr. Finci wants the equal right to vote and be voted for, but unfortunately this is not the case," Bosnia's ambassador to Israel, Nedeljko Maslesa, told The Jerusalem Post on Friday. "The Bosnian government is aware of the case, but has no official position on it."

The Minority Rights Group International in London and Sheri Rosenberg, director of the program in Holocaust and Human Rights Studies at Yeshiva University's Benjamin N. Cordozo Law school in New York, are supporting Finci's application.

"As far as [we] are aware, there is no other case in Europe where Jews are actually prevented from contesting the presidency" an official from the Minority Rights Group said in a statement. "Ironically, the Bosnian constitution is a modern day creation, but de facto reinforces centuries-old discrimination." There are about 500 Jews living in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

[kronos77]

[kronos77]

By new constitutional reforms, Muslims want to erase even Ortodox and catholics from constitution, leaving only "Bosnians" as integral nation...

Entire Bosnian war was fough when Serb Bortodox wanted to be recognised as constitutional nation alongside Muslims.

[kinoxi]

Interesting...

[Ancesthntr]

"Ironically, the Bosnian constitution is a modern day creation, but de facto reinforces centuries-old discrimination."

What's so ironic? Who seriously believes that we are any more moral in large groups than in the past? The simple reason why it is NOT ironic is that we are 2 generations past the Holocaust, so the taboo against anti-Semitism is wearing off. Its back to the future on that score.

"The Bosnian government is aware of the case, but has no official position on it."

Screw Bosnia and its government.

[Bokababe]

This is incredibly obnoxious. Who wrote this constitution? The Wahhabis?

Bosnia's rotating presidency is working about as well as the rotating presidency that Tito left behind -- which is to say, not at all!

[Diocletian]

Can a non-Jew be President of Israel?

[Banat]

IMHO, the severity of the problem is exacerbated by the fact that Bosnia's Constitution had to be OK'd by the "international community" before it was ever rubber st...erm...democratically adopted & proclaimed.

I don't know about Israel's laws - but that doesn't really matter. I don't think relativizing the issue is the answer, Dioklecijane. It is unacceptable that the Jews should be treated in this manner in the XXI century, no matter how small their community in Bosnia. Old habits die hard, I suppose.

[Diocletian]

It's somewhat hypocritical. BTW, the most popular politician amongst Bosnian Croatians these days is Milorad Dodik.

[Banat]

It is hypocritical, but why does Bosnia feel threatened by a few hundred Jews? Why can't they stand for election? That's the question.

[Diocletian]

I honestly don't think that the question has been raised and as we all know, Constitutional reform has stalled since the Muslims want a centralized state and both of us want a decentralized one. But in regards to Finci, are Jews a nation or religion? If they're a nation, then it'd have to open up to all minority nations.

[lqclamar]

So Jews can't run for office in Muslim Bosnia - the same place that embraced the invading Hitler army because it gave them an opportunity to murder Jews and Serbs. There's a shocker. /sarc

The flag flown by Balkan muslims during WWII:

[Diocletian]

1. For office of President....not general office. This law wasn't meant to exclude Jews since it excludes all who aren't Muslim, Croatian, or Serbian.

2. The Handzar SS had no role in rounding up Jews in Bosnia.

[F-117A]

clinton Legacy bump!

[lqclamar]

This is incredibly obnoxious. Who wrote this constitution? The Wahhabis?

Probably this guy:
Photo: Alija Izetbegovic, 1st President of Bosnia

The liberals, naturally, worshipped him as a "moderate" muslim leader who was a former "political prisoner" of the Tito regime.

Izetbegovic did serve two terms in prison under Tito. Both of them were deserved though. The first was for being a Nazi collaborator during World War II. The second was in the 1970's when he published a radical islamist political tract about trying to institute Sharia law in Bosnia.

[lqclamar]

2. The Handzar SS had no role in rounding up Jews in Bosnia.

Actually they assisted in propping up the Ustashe regime, which was very much complicit in the Holocaust of the Jews. A muslim Kosovar detachment of 1,000 troops from the Handschar was also attached to the 21st SS Skanderbeg in 1944, which directly participated in rounding up Jews in Kosovo.

[Diocletian]

1. The Handzar were only nominally allied to the Ustasha regime. The Ustashe themselves were opposed to the creation of the Handzar and actively sabotaged it. The Muslim Imams who lobbied for the creation of the Handzar unit (at Himmler's request) wanted the unit to form the core of a new army for a Bosnia detached from Croatia (and placed under Nazi protection). Naturally Pavelic and the Ustashe opposed this and Pavelic sent his jack of all trades Vjekoslav Vrancic to Hitler to fix this. Hitler conceded that an all-Muslim unit would certainly affect the NDH negatively. Upon his return from Berchtesgaden, Vrancic and others placed Croats of dubious political allegiances into the Handzar. This resulted in the revolt of a large part of the unit while in the south of France in "Villefranche". Funnily enough, upon the Handzar's return to Bosnia, they worked together with the Serbian Chetniks in anti-Partisan sweeps in Eastern Bosnia.

2. The Skanderbeg did indeed commit those actions in Kosovo, but my point about the Handzar not rounding up Jews stands.

George Lepre wrote an excellent book on the Handzar.

[zimdog]

lqclamar,

you've been told numerous times to stop referring to the Nazi Waffen-SS emblem as "the flag flown by Balkan muslims during WWII." You might be obtuse, but it's now clear that you prefer spreading lies and disinformation. I think you've posted this about 10 times, which means that you'll probably follow your friends' advice and repeat it another 999,990 times in hopes that it will become the truth.


it won't. a lie is a lie, no matter how often you repeat it.

[lqclamar]

you've been told numerous times to stop referring to the Nazi Waffen-SS emblem as "the flag flown by Balkan muslims during WWII."

Sorry zimmy, but I don't take orders from dishonest agitators.

Unless you have evidence that the Handschar was not composed of Balkan Muslims, my description of their flag - the Balkan Muslim Nazi flag - is accurate.

[zimdog]

Unless you have evidence that the Handschar was not composed of Balkan Muslims, my description of their flag - the Balkan Muslim Nazi flag - is accurate.

That is the flag of a military unit. It is not the flag of "the Muslims" in the Balkans. If you use the definite article, you are being unambiguous about ascribing the flag to the entire Muslim community. When a 6 year old girl is represented by a military flag, let me know. Until then, stop lying.

[Diocletian]

Zimdog is correct since the Handzar only represented a portion of Bosnia's Muslims. It certainly didn't represent those in Croatian Domobran units, Ustasha units. It certainly didn't represent men like Mustafa Mulalic who led a Muslim detachment in the Serb royalist Chetniks or men like Hamdija Pozderac, a Muslim in Tito's Partisans.