{"id":323,"date":"2016-07-11T19:57:13","date_gmt":"2016-07-11T19:57:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/?p=323"},"modified":"2016-07-11T19:57:13","modified_gmt":"2016-07-11T19:57:13","slug":"remembering-srebrenica","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/2016\/07\/11\/remembering-srebrenica\/","title":{"rendered":"Remembering Srebrenica"},"content":{"rendered":"

Remembering Srebrenica<\/span>
\nBy Lauren Peace<\/span><\/h2>\n
Today marks the 21st anniversary of the murder of thousands. Srebrenica, Bosnia-Herzegovina is the site of Europe’s greatest genocide since the Holocaust. A few weeks ago, while traveling the Balkans, I paid a visit to the Srebrenica Genocide Memorial. Below is the journal entry that I made that day.\u00a0<\/span><\/em><\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\"Srebrenica
Srebrenica Genocide Memorial<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

June 23rd, 2016<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Srebrenica
Srebrenica Genocide Memorial<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Do you remember when we learned about Srebrenica in school?<\/strong><\/p>\n

You wouldn\u2019t. Because we didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

At least I didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

When I was first posed with the possibility of traveling to the Balkans to pursue documentary work on post-conflict transformation, I was confronted with a reality that I had gone blind to for so long.<\/p>\n

Albania. Bosnia. Kosovo. Macedonia.<\/p>\n

The familiarity lies in the name alone.<\/p>\n

When I made the decision to travel to Kosovo for the summer, I made the decision to immerse myself in a culture that I had spent my first 20-years neglecting.<\/p>\n

The history is striking. The timing is ironic.<\/p>\n

I was born in Pennsylvania in the fall of 1995. Just 3 months earlier in Srebrenica, 8,000 Bosnians were slain by Serbs in what stands as Europe\u2019s greatest genocide since World War II.
\n<\/span>
\nToday, a graveyard for the victims acts as a memorial. Tombstones line the fields in which innocent blood was shed \u2013 for nothing.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"20160623-IMG_0591\"<\/p>\n

H<\/span>asan Hasanovi\u0107 is a survivor, and he welcomes us to the memorial.<\/span><\/strong>
\n\u00a0<\/strong>
\nHe is strong and tranquil in semblance, but his eyes have seen sickening things.<\/p>\n

Hasan survived by walking 63 km through a wooded area to the neighboring Muslim territory of Tuzla. Both his father and twin brother were lost at Srebrenica. He was just 19 at the time of the massacre.<\/p>\n

\u201cEveryday, I wonder where I got that strength. When you\u2019re in that kind of situation, where every step is a matter of life and death, your mind just works differently. The experience has stayed with me since then. It follows me everyday; from the moment I get up, to the moment I go to sleep. I just can\u2019t get rid of it. The worst thing is the anguish that comes with thinking about Husein and my father \u2014 wondering how they were killed, whether they were tortured or not, and how long it took them to die. That pain is almost unbearable.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

https:\/\/www.srebrenica.org.uk\/survivor-stories\/hasan-hasanovic\/<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Srebrenica
Srebrenica Genocide Memorial<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Bosnia-Herzegovina continues to face ethnic conflict and division today. Many Bosniaks, Croats, and Serbs hope for unity in the future, but events of the past linger. There is much more healing to be done and accountability to be held before the possibility of a concrete reconciliation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Remembering Srebrenica By Lauren Peace Today marks the 21st anniversary of the murder of thousands. Srebrenica, Bosnia-Herzegovina is the site of Europe’s greatest genocide since the Holocaust. A few weeks ago, while traveling the Balkans, I paid a visit to the Srebrenica Genocide Memorial. Below is the journal entry that I made that day.\u00a0 June … Continue reading “Remembering Srebrenica”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":29,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-323","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/29"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=323"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":332,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/323\/revisions\/332"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=323"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=323"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pj.rit.edu\/kosovo\/journal\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=323"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}