For Bosnia & Herzegovina, Bernard Henri Levy was the champion demanding that Europe act. Francois Mitterrand was too absorbed in his prejudices but Nicolas Sarkozy apparently has come to see France's inaction as betraying French and European ideals. Mitterrand – a Policy Based on Bigotry Bernard Henri Levy's standing as writer and intellectual provided the type of access that is especially decisive in Paris. Its kind of France's version of Kennedy Arts Center honoree and "American Idol" winner come to the White House. Bernard had been a friend of President Francois Mitterrand that is until the French President refused to confront Slobodan Milosevic and his Serbian military as it attempted to overrun BiH. Levy quickly disowned him. Mitterrand was consumed with xenophobic distaste toward anything labeled Muslim or perhaps anything not "pure French European." Mitterrand had never outgrown the values of his Vichy France collaboration, but had only managed to cover-up his anti-Semitism until late in his life he presumably did not care what we thought of him. Sarkozy learned from Bosnia Experience Being on the “Wrong Side” Bernard related, (as he was interviewed on CNN's Fareed Zakaria program), that while he is now credited as having prompted President Sarkozy to intervene to save the Libyan opposition from annihilation at Benghazi, the French President had already actually been inclined to act having learned from a previous lesson. According to Bernard, then Minister (Budget) Nicholas Sarkozy in the French Gaullist Government during the last term of Mitterrand's Presidency had wanted France to confront Serbia's aggression and ethnic cleansing in BiH. As Bernard relayed France not only failed to confront Milosevic, Radovan Karadzic and General Ratko Mladic, but under Mitterrand implicitly supported what both Sarkozy and Levy understood as the "wrong side." Libyan Opposition is Not “Fascislamist” Bernard Henri Levy was one of the first outsiders to meet with the Benghazi oppositions( going there with another old ally and mutual friend Gilles Herzog). He took a private plane from Egypt to eastern Libya to see for himself who the Libyan opposition is. Bernard is convinced that these are not Al-Qaeda inclined reformers, (and being of Jewish background and sensitive to the anti-Semitism of the Holocaust and its French collaborators, Levy's evaluation should carry some weight. Levy also has introduced the term "fascislamism" to define radical Islamist ideology which has also angered some Muslims). Levy has challenged all of those who were speculating regarding the Libyan opposition's links to "radical Islam" to name at least one such individual in the provisional leadership. No one took-up Levy's challenge. Repeat Rumor Enough & It Becomes Accepted Fact! The enthusiasm in some European capitals and Washington has been blunted by such presumed links of Libya's opposition to Al-Qaeda or radical Islam. Personally, I cannot make a thorough assessment, (although from my 4 years of living in Libya as a young boy, Libyan's tended to be the least inclined by character toward extremism, Colonel Gaddafi being a clear exception). It is though a frequent habit for presumed political and intelligence experts to apply rumors and stereotypes in lieu of actual evidence. Repeated often enough, these "intelligence reports" take on the aura of credible information. “Free Lance Diplomacy”? Bernard Henri Levy undoubtedly does not fit the mold of diplomat. His "free-lance" diplomacy may not sit comfortably with those who are within the structures. Nonetheless, besides President Sarkozy, he has other friends within the governmental structures or at least those who frequently share his views and support his initiatives (Jean-David Levitte). While Alain Juppe, France's current Foreign Minister may have been caught a bit by surprise by his country’s recognition of the Benghazi opposition as the legitimate Libyan government, (including deploying an Ambassador), France has probably played a more coordinated role as perhaps compared to Washington in addressing Libya - where even the Republican opposition happens to be on the extremes of the pro and con as to whether to aid the Libyan opposition. Interestingly, Alain Juppe was also Foreign Minister/Prime Minister during the Gaullists cohabitation with Mitterrand in the early 1990's. In my interaction with Juppe, I did not sense a gap in his policy toward BiH from that of Mitterrand. To the contrary, he was one of the European and American political leaders who prompted the crafting of an "ethnic delineation" or presumed solution to the conflict. Perhaps though like Malcolm Rifkin, another wunderkind of politics and UK Defense Minister in the early 1990's, he has also had a reconsideration of how Europe dealt with the BiH conflict. In urging European/NATO engagement regarding Libya and the "no-fly zone," Rifkin acknowledged mistakes (inaction and unfair arms-embargo favoring Serbia’s advantage) in the policy of his Government (PM John Major's) and Europe as a whole and urged they not be repeated regarding Libya. Bernard also is not purely analytical in his analysis or dispassionate in pursuing his views. The Libyan opposition can expect a staunch ally and activist. In my meetings with Bernard and his good friend Gilles Herzog, I did not perceive that passion was driving the intellect. (After all, they are “intellectuals’). However, the intellectual commitment then drove unabashed enthusiasm for the cause. What ever else has happened with Bernard Henri Levy’s course, from a friend of “Bosnia’s Muslims” to a critic of “fascislamism,” he has continued to be a consistent proponent of the original ideals of BiH’s struggle to survive as a multi-ethnic and open society. Rather than blame the Bosnian/Herzegovinian defenders, he has placed as much or more burden on the failures of western democracies in addressing BiH. Blame for Bosnia’s Failures as Much of European/Western Policy of Ethnic Defined Solutions Below is a worthwhile review of a film Bernard directed, “Bosna.” As he pointed out, it was not intended to be a neutral documentary but an impartial analysis of why the western democracies had a humanitarian and strategic interest in defending BiH pluralism. By the result of what ethnic cleansing has delivered and been allowed to sustain, Bernard Henri Levy will be judged favorably for his efforts in BiH. The evaluation of history still awaits both Levy and the western democracies on Libya. By Ambassador Muhamed Sacirbey Face Book at “Diplomatically Incorrect” Twitter - DiplomaticallyX “Bosna” reviewed by Gareth Rees BOSNA! A film review by Gareth Rees Copyright 1994 Gareth Rees Director: Bernard-Henri Levy, Alain Ferrari Camera: Pierre Boffety Editors: Frederic Lossignol, Yann Kassile Music: Denis Barbier Duration: 117 minutes Bosnia/France 1994 It's hard to approach the good and bad in this film without being caught up a discussion of the message of BOSNA!, for this is a film that explicitly sets out to convert its audience to its side, to make people aware of the war and to try to influence them to pressure their governments to intervene. It's a film that's very aware of itself, of the process of its making and of the influence it might have: for example, Mitterand's visit to Bosnia is portrayed as an outcome of information given to the French President by the director, Bernard-Henri Levy. The film is full of very disturbing images: a mother and child fleeing from snipers in Sarajevo; bodies littering a street after a shell has landed on a bread queue, many of them with legs or faces blown off; starving prisoners staring at the camera through the barbed wire of a concentration camp. It's impossible not to be moved by the suffering of these people, and difficult not to feel anger at the inaction of the diplomats who do little but talk while people are fighting for their lives and homes. The film makes much of comparisons between Western indifference to Bosnia today and Western indifference to Czechoslovakia and the Spanish Republic in the 1930s. There is, suggests Levy, the same denial, the same explanations that it's all much too complex to get involved in. In 1945 people saw pictures of the concentration camps in Poland and said "never again", but now that the camps are back it seems that we would rather deny them, or suggest that there's fault on both sides, then determine to stop the atrocities. If there is anything I don't like about BOSNA!, it is the incessant wordiness of the voice-over. Perhaps Levy was so anxious to persuade that he didn't dare to let the audience come to their own conclusions. At times sounding like a Biblical prophet, at times hectoring us, at times reflecting on how the war affects our image of ourselves as Europeans, the narration never lets the eloquent pictures speak for themselves, pictures that have more than enough power to move and to persuade on their own. * Cambridge Arts Cinema hosted the British premiere of BOSNA!, a powerful and disturbing film about the war in Bosnia-Herzegovina and about the reluctance of governments in Western Europe to acknowledge what was going on and their refusal to offer real assistance to Bosnia. Director Bernard-Henri Levy gave a short talk before the film. He said that the BOSNA!, filmed in Sarajevo between September 1993 and January 1994, and in other parts of Bosnia in March and April of this year, was neither a dispassionate documentary nor an artistic film; but was the answer to the question "What can I do to help these people, to make their heroic struggle known?" He wanted the film to be as militant and passionate as possible without being inaccurate in its presentation of the facts. A question and answer session followed the film, chaired by Leonard Doyle of "The Independent." The questioners mostly expressed positive opinions of the films and asked Levy about the relationship between his film and a wider historical context. The film made much of the comparisons between the West s failure to intervene in Bosnia and its failure to take a stand over Czechoslovakia and Spain in the 1930s, but what about the many conflicts within and between other ex-communist states, such as Armenia and Azerbaijan? Levy said that his own memory and family history was concerned with World War Two, and so that was where he turned more naturally. He also wanted to try to convince people in England that they should come to the aid of Bosnia as they had come to the aid of France. He suggested that the West wasn't doing enough to help the post-communist states towards democracy, and that we risked the creation of monsters from the volatile mixture of fascism, nationalism and communism in these countries. One questioner suggested that the reluctance of the West to become involved was out of a fear of Islamic fundamentalism in what the media portray as a predominately Muslim state. Levy agreed, and said that this was an inaccurate view of Bosnia. Sarajevo had been a "second Jerusalem," a city in which sizable communities of Jews, Christians and Muslims lived and worshiped in peace. Levy described a meeting with Bosian President Izetbegovic at the world premiere of BOSNA! in early June. Izetbegovic said that he had always refused a fundamentalist Islamic state, but if the West were to stand back and lets the country be partitioned along ethnic lines, then Bosnia may have to become one. One questioner disagreed. He said that the conflict in Bosnia was much more complex than the film suggested, and that it was a mistake not to examine the origins of the present conflict in World War Two, in which the Serbians resisted fascism while Muslims were recruited into the German army. Levy responded passionately. He said that being right in 1945 didn't make the Serbians right now; even if their grandparents had fought Hitler, that didn t excuse concentration camps and ethnic cleansing. Bernard-Henri Levy made a very positive impression on me; he seemed full of respect for the Bosnians he had met and spoken with and filmed, and full of energy and passion to tell their story to the world. .