Rival Aspirations, or Historical Antagonisms?

The above summary of the history of the conflict deliberately downplayed the religious aspects. The question under review here is to what extent was religion a key factor? Was it a prime cause of violence? Was it, as has been argued for Northern Ireland, a marker of identity but not a significant cause of conflict? Was it incidental to the main issues involved? This discussion will argue that religion was used during the violence as a very important marker of identity, and that some on both sides drew inspiration from religious sources. With respect to Muslim involvement, I shall argue that reference to Islam was more reactive than primary, although there are no few commentators who always saw the issue as one of holding back an Islamist threat. Bosnian Muslims, it was said, aimed to ‘set up a fundamentalist Jamahariyya (people's state)’ (Sells 1998: 120). Margaret Thatcher, urging President Bush to take action, spoke of the need to spare Europe from ‘an Islamic time bomb’ (cited by Duran 1995: 36). Certainly, Jihadists flocked to the aid of their fellow Muslims in Bosnia. It is also true that as a result of the conflict some Bosnian Muslims have become more sympathetic towards an Islamist agenda. Duran comments that, faced by the possibility of almost complete annihilation and by the seeming indifference of the global community, Muslims developed ‘an increasingly strident Islamic identity’ (1995: 181).