More than a quarter century ago, I covered the war in Bosnia for the Washington Post and wrote a book about it. I saw a once-stable country torn apart by a violent consortium of nationalists, bigots, and opportunists. What I learned is unfortunately relevant to America now.
I hoped my book's epilogue would never resonate as it does for America these days. "I am now more aware of the fragility of human relations, and more aware of what being a Jew can mean," I wrote ages ago. "I learned this from the Muslims of Bosnia, who made two fatal mistakes."
"They thought that being a minority group no longer mattered in civilized Europe, and they thought the wild beast had been tamed. They failed to realize that although a person might attach little importance to his religion, other people might take notice one day."
"Just because your society seems stable does not mean it will always be so. Muslims versus Christians, Jews versus non-Jews, whites versus blacks, poor versus rich -- there are so many seams along which a society can be torn apart by the manipulators."
"These are the lessons of Bosnia that have stayed with me and, perhaps, altered me. The wild beast is out there, and the ground no longer feels so steady under my feet."
These are very early days in what does not have to be a catastrophe in America. We have the knowledge and the resources to avoid the worst. The virulence of the Republican Party and Donald Trump is not predestined to triumph.
Here's that passage in the epilogue, and a link to the book, "Love Thy Neighbor: A Story of War." amazon.com/Love-Thy-Neigh… 
