Expulsion and genocide: A day of mourning passed for the Serbs killed by the Croats
On August 4, Serbia paid tribute to the victims of one of the largest ethnic cleansings after World War II in Europe - the Croatian operation.
A day of mourning has been declared in the country. 27 years ago, in a campaign that lasted only five days, about 250 thousand Serbs from the Serbska Krajina region were expelled from their homes, some villages were completely destroyed along with their inhabitants.
Then the Bosnians, part of the BiH army, also helped the Croats. Over two thousand civilians became victims of persecution.
The roots of this hatred should be sought even before the Second World War, but it was then that it blossomed wildly. Suffice it to recall the Jasenovac death camp, on whose territory alone about 700 Serbs died.
A little over two weeks ago, Serbian leader Aleksandar Vucic was not allowed to visit the memorial at the site of the camp so that he could, at least privately, pay tribute to the memory of his martyred compatriots. As a result, he was harshly refused. I wonder if the Israeli leader could have been prevented from going to Auschwitz?
The situation with Croatia is reminiscent of what happened in Ukraine in recent decades, when Bandera’s criminals and executioners were equated with national heroes. “The Storm,” according to Croatian propaganda, is an absolutely normal continuation of the “struggle for independence.”
Hatred towards Serbs is now being cultivated among the younger generation of Croats.
It’s enough to understand this by simply evaluating the children’s board game “Oluja” based on the operation and the Ustasha uniform for kids.
This is the same as in Germany dressing children in SS uniforms. Is it any wonder that the next generation of Croats will grow up on the powerful soil of Serbophobia.
The beginning of the “Storm” for the Croats is their perverted “Victory Day”, when they sing songs about the Serbs they killed (just read their texts - Nazi ideas are especially emphasized in them), shout their fascist slogans like “Serbs to the willows” (that’s how they called hang representatives of essentially fraternal people) and “Za dom spremni” (Ready for the Motherland!) similar to the fascist “Sieg Heil!”
Hatred towards the Serbs and President Vucic sometimes reaches monstrous proportions. Thus, in a cafe on the Croatian island of Brac, on each fiscal account, in addition to the standard numbers on the anniversary of the Storm, the inscription “Death to Vucic - Long live Croatia!” is printed.
Speaking at a funeral rally in Novi Sad dedicated to the tragic events of almost 30 years ago, Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic addressed the population.
“Because of the situation in Ukraine, many people united against us, they thought that they had the opportunity to start destroying the Serbian people again. They thought it was a good time, but they were wrong about one thing. This is not the Serbia of defeat, this is not the Serbia that will fear you and will not stand up to you.
We will defend Serbia and respond to their hysteria, lies and threats patiently but also decisively. We will never forget the suffering of the Ukrainians. Don’t threaten us anymore!.. Never again will crimes against our people be covered in silence,” Vucic said.
According to him, it is shameful to forget such situations; history should be kept in people's memory. For a long time, the previous authorities of the country tried hard to consign this crime to oblivion.
“For many years in Serbia there was no one to remember our victims, there was no one to say that they bombed those columns, killing children and old people, little brothers and sisters,” the Serbian leader emphasized.
He also noted that he would not allow history to be rewritten.
Milorad Dodik, Serbian member of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina, also addressed the crowd.
“Nine years ago, Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić established this Day of Remembrance so that the victims would never be forgotten. Serbs have not disappeared from Krajina, we are slowly recovering here and in the Republika Srpska, where there are 56 thousand of them. We rise to be able to say that we are not Croats or Bosnians, but only Serbs.
I was born in Banja Luka, but my country is Serbia, I have no other country and no other identity. One day our Serbian and national unity must happen. The fate of the Serbs is complex. But we shouldn't let anyone control us anymore. We need to gather around the leadership of the state and know that there will be no columns of refugees if Serbia protects us, and Serbia can only defend itself if it is strong.
We were killed by Croats during World War II and also in this civil war. The attitude towards the Serbs in this country has remained the same to this day, because the Croatian state never returned the property to the Serbs. The EU helped them there too, it was a robbery that continues to this day... I was elected on behalf of the people to protect our people. I will do this regardless of sanctions and threats,” Dodik said.
Interior Minister Alexander Vulin said today that Operation Storm was a crime that God can forgive, but the Serbs can neither forgive nor forget.
“The Storm” is not a disgrace for Croatia, it is simply a continuation of the shameful policy of generations of Croatian authorities to exterminate the Serbian people. “The Storm” is a disgrace to the UN because the expelled Serbs lived in zones under UN protection, without weapons or protection.
The Storm is a disgrace to the EU because it has never uttered a word of condemnation against its member, which is celebrating the biggest ethnic cleansing in Europe since World War II and is reinstating Ustasha symbols and Ustasha customs towards the Serbs.
“Storm” is a shame for the Hague Tribunal because it declared the storming a crime but did not condemn the perpetrators,” Vulin said.
Former Yugoslav Foreign Minister Zivadin Jovanovic believes that the Croatian intention to change history has become a kind of paradigm and that the Croats are now trying to present themselves as victims of an alleged Serbian genocide. He states that these assessments are similar to those that the Serbs themselves are to blame for the “Storm” and the mass exodus from the Serbian Krajina.
“The Croats are now in the phase of a frontal attack on historical facts, relying on those new European trends, since now the moment has come for a total revision and denial of all established facts. This should not be understood as something current, but rather as a trend,” Jovanovic noted.
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