Namka Hedis watched as Serbian soldiers called Chetniks shot her husband in front of her house. Then the Chetniks put a knife to her throat, pointed at her four children, and said, "Choose which one of your children is to die. You must give us one of them." According to journalist Paul Harris—who interviewed Namka after the event—the aggrieved mother could not choose which child to sacrifice, so the soldiers seized her youngest daughter, Anita. Although the Chetniks did not kill Anita, the child was so traumatized by what occurred that day she no longer speaks. The Serbian soldiers then turned the family out of the village, forcing them to become refugees.

Ethnic cleansing—a term coined for the type of genocide engaged in during the Bosnian war—took many forms. In most cases, invading soldiers such as the Chetniks...