Alija Izetbegovic Quotes

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Alija Izetbegovic

Profession : Activist

Birth : August 8, 1925

To seek trouble - this is not courage, this is madness. Courage is the willingness of man to sensibly face the troubles he cannot avoid.

Alija Izetbegovic

When you are in prison, you have but one desire: freedom. If you fall ill in prison, you do not think about freedom - you think about health. Health is, therefore, more important than freedom.

Alija Izetbegovic

Life is a dangerous thing. Insecurity is the price of living.

Alija Izetbegovic

A starry sky is equally interesting to a scientist, a mystic, an ethics scholar, and a poet. Looking at the stars, each experiences something different, and each sees his own picture.

Alija Izetbegovic

I took revenge on hardship from my earlier life by forgetting it.

Alija Izetbegovic

It is difficult to help a man without hurting his pride. Everyone wants to be a giver and not a receiver.

Alija Izetbegovic

I would sacrifice peace in order to win sovereignty for Bosnia, but for that peace in Bosnia, I would not sacrifice sovereignty.

Alija Izetbegovic

We have no rational evidence that there exists another world, but we have a clear feeling that man does not exist only to produce and to consume.

Alija Izetbegovic

In these negotiations we are not a helpless object, although great world powers are involved. We play an active role and try to influence our destiny; we have our own trump cards and we use them.

Alija Izetbegovic

I believe that the people, instead of pretty lies, should be told the truth, no matter how ugly it may be. What can we do, destiny hasn't been kind to us; but, with the help of God, we will prevail.

Alija Izetbegovic

Our goal: the Islamization of Muslims. Our methods: to believe and to struggle.

Alija Izetbegovic

The international community is pushing things forward in Bosnia... but it is doing it at expense of the Muslim people. I feel it as an injustice, these are the things that I cannot live with.

Alija Izetbegovic

We Bosniaks would for sure fight for integrity of Bosnia.

Alija Izetbegovic

Bosnia is a complicated country: three religions, three nations and those 'others'. Nationalism is strong in all three nations; in two of them there are a lot of racism, chauvinism, separatism; and now we are supposed to make a state out of that.

Alija Izetbegovic

As far as the sovereignty of Bosnia-Hercegovina is concerned we agreed to have limited sovereignty for a limited time and that is clear from the Dayton Agreement.

Alija Izetbegovic

Whether man is a product of evolution or is 'created' becomes the question, 'Who is man? Is he part of the world or something different from it?'

Alija Izetbegovic

Islam is a way of living rather than a way of thinking.

Alija Izetbegovic

All in all this is a difficult political struggle which will go on for years, in which our people won't die anymore; I'm not sure how much we will be able to win, but I'm certain that we won't loose anything that we have now.

Alija Izetbegovic

Socialism and freedom are not compatible, regardless of repeated convincings.

Alija Izetbegovic

Religion, as it is understood in the West, does not lead toward progress, and science does not lead toward humanism.

Alija Izetbegovic