The term Serb Muslims has several uses:
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Gajret
Gajret (known as Serbian Muslim Cultural Society after 1929) was a cultural society established in 1903 that promoted Serbian identity among the Slavic Muslims of Austria-Hungary (today's Bosnia and Herzegovina). The organization viewed that the Muslims were Serbs lacking ethnic consciousness. The view that Muslims were Serbs is probably the oldest of three ethnic theories among the Bosnian Muslims themselves. It was dismantled by the Independent State of Croatia during World War II. Some members, non-Communists, joined or collaborated with the Yugoslav Partisans, while others joined the Chetniks.
World War I
Muslims joined the Serbian army in World War I. The majority were Muslims who had a Serb identity, declaring as Serbs. Among notable soldiers were Avdo Hasanbegović, Šukrija Kurtović, Ibrahim Hadžimerović, Fehim Musakadić, Hamid Kukić, Rešid Kurtagić, who all fought as Serbian volunteer officers at the Salonica Front. Among the most active in the group of Muslims who were engaged in Yugoslav propaganda on Austro-Hungarian Muslim POWs were A. Hasanbegović, Azis Sarić, F. Musakadić, Alija Džemidžić, R. Kurtagić, Asim Šeremeta, Hamid Kukić and Ibrahim Hadžiomerović.
World War II
During World War II in Yugoslavia, few Bosnian Muslims joined the Chetniks. These espoused a Serb ethnic identity. The most notable of these was Ismet Popovac, who commanded the Muslim National Military Organization (Muslimanska narodna vojna organizacija, MNVO). The resolution of MNVO states that "Muslims are an integral part of Serbdom". World War I veteran Fehim Musakadić also joined the Chetniks.
Second Yugoslavia
In the 1948 census, Bosnian Muslims were allowed to declare as "Serb-Muslims", "Croat-Muslims" or "Undetermined" Muslims, the overwhelming majority choosing the option undetermined.
Some prominent Bosnian Muslims openly declared as Serbs, such as writer Meša Selimović.
Yugoslav Wars
During early talks of the partition of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Ejup Ganić remarked that the Bosniaks "are Islamized Serbs", and should thus join the Serb side, at a time when the SDA shifted in favour of siding with the Serbs and continuing struggling against the Croats. Political analyst Jochen Hippler noted in 1994 that "Muslims are mostly ethnically Serb, a minority Croat, but this did not save them from being slaughtered by their fellow ethnic groups for being different."
Serb nationalists usually insisted that Bosnian Muslims were Serbs that had abandoned their faith.
Serbian censuses
In the 1953 census in Serbia, of those who declared as ethnic Serbs, 0.4% declared Islam as their religion. In the 2011 census, that percentage was 0.04%.