Drawing a line on a map and saying Jews go this side and Muslims go this side
Which isn’t want happened with the said countries
To be a bit more constructive than what I wrote in my previous comment: ethnicity was very often defined using religion in the Balkans:
After the Greek war of independence, Christian former Ottoman subjects renamed themselves as “Greek”. At the Treaty of Lausanne, this went further and Christians in Anatolia were declared Greek and forced to move to Greece, whereas Mulsims in Greece were declared Turks and forced to move to Greece.
During the “Struggle for Macedonia”, adherence to the Constantinople Patriarchate made someone Greek, adherence to the Sofia Exarchate made someone Bulgarian.
Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats share the same language. At the origin, the difference was pretty much religious and maps neatly to Muslim, Orthodox, and Catholic.
The only Balkan people that seem to have somehow miraculously overcome the religious fragmentation of ethnic identity are the Albanians.
Sure thing, I haven’t replied to your other comment yet because it’s a lot to unpack and understand, and it’s not convenient yet; but with this post you bring up some more salient points I haven’t considered. My POV has been more the breakup of Yugoslavia, which felt like a conflict over territory by groups of people, wheras Israel’s was more of a “straight lines drawn on maps”. I was not aware of the specific historical motivations and perspectives for the yugoslav wars.
You might want to refine your other post a bit. I’m still interested in responding to you, just later. Thank you for having the self reflection to analyse your previous statements and provide clarifications.
To be a bit more constructive than what I wrote in my previous comment: ethnicity was very often defined using religion in the Balkans:
The only Balkan people that seem to have somehow miraculously overcome the religious fragmentation of ethnic identity are the Albanians.
Sure thing, I haven’t replied to your other comment yet because it’s a lot to unpack and understand, and it’s not convenient yet; but with this post you bring up some more salient points I haven’t considered. My POV has been more the breakup of Yugoslavia, which felt like a conflict over territory by groups of people, wheras Israel’s was more of a “straight lines drawn on maps”. I was not aware of the specific historical motivations and perspectives for the yugoslav wars.
You might want to refine your other post a bit. I’m still interested in responding to you, just later. Thank you for having the self reflection to analyse your previous statements and provide clarifications.