Images of Atrocities in Bosnia Stir Protest : Balkans: Jewish groups react to reports of tortures and murders. Community cannot afford to be bystanders, a Nazi death camp survivor says.

Spurred by Holocaust-like images and phrases such as “ethnic cleansing,” about 125 Jews gathered on Los Angeles’ Westside on Friday to urge world leaders to stop the Serbs’ alleged mistreatment of their Muslim and Croat foes in Bosnia-Herzegovina.

“It is happening again,” warned Rabbi Harold M. Schulweis of Valley Beth Shalom Temple. “The shock of recognition is overwhelming. We’ve heard it before.”

The reports of atrocities from the former Yugoslav republics include stories of torture, starvation and murder, along with accounts of sealed boxcars carrying men, women and children to concentration camps.

Schulweis, representing the Jewish Foundation for Christian Rescuers, was one of four speakers at a meeting Friday morning at Anti-Defamation League local headquarters.

The ADL sponsored the event with the American Jewish Committee, the American Jewish Congress, the Jewish Federation Council and the Martyrs Memorial and Museum of the Holocaust.

There is no confirmation of genocide in the Serbian camps, as was the case with the systematic murder of 6 million Jews by the Nazis. But Friday’s speakers insisted that an ounce of outrage may prevent the loss of countless pounds of flesh.

“The Jewish community cannot afford to assume the role of bystanders,” said Holocaust survivor Samuel Getz. “The human race cannot afford another horror story.”

The Serbs have denied any plans for genocide of their enemies--or even that civilians are being held in the camps. They define “ethnic cleansing” as geographical segregation of warring factions in what was once Yugoslavia.

To Jews, however, the phrase evokes images of slaughter, and speakers said they have a special obligation to take preemptive action. They urged national and international leaders to investigate prison camp conditions fully and pressure the Serbs to treat their foes humanely.

“We must say we recognize with horror what happened and we did everything we could to keep the names of (Serbian prison camps) Omarska and Brcko from serving the same gruesome and grotesque function of Auschwitz,” said Faith Cookler, chairwoman of the executive committee of the Anti-Defamation League.

News reports, based on interviews with prison guards and refugees, report wholesale killing. Photos taken through barbed wire show emaciated prisoners. The Serbian forces reportedly have refused to allow meaningful inspection of the camps, despite a growing clamor from human rights organizations and the United Nations.

The Los Angeles Jewish community groups that organized Friday’s protest are among many coalitions promoting a widespread public demand for intervention into the civil war in the Balkans.

About 150 demonstrators attended a candlelight vigil and “action rally against death camps and ‘ethnic cleansing’ ” Friday night at the Federal Building in Westwood. It was sponsored by Jewish and Muslim groups. The coalition is holding another rally on Sunday afternoon at the same location.

The Simon Wiesenthal Center at 9760 Pico Blvd. will be open Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. to garner letters from the public urging President Bush to act.

The Slovenian-American Council has scheduled a demonstration at noon Monday at the downtown Federal Building.