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Italian Jewish leaders condemn parliament president for honoring neo-Fascist party
(JTA) — Jewish leaders in Italy had strong words for the president of the country’s parliament after he published a post on Instagram honoring the history of the Italian Social Movement, or MSI, a neo-fascist party founded in the wake of World War II.
Ignazio la Russa, a senator from Cologno Monzese, a municipality in Milan, wrote alongside a picture of an MSI campaign poster: “In memory of my father, who was one of the founders of the Italian Social Movement in Sicily and who chose the path of free and democratic participation with the MSI throughout his life in defense of his ideas respectful of the Italian Constitution.”
Leaders within Italy’s Jewish community were dismayed by his decision to link MSI to the post-World War II Italian constitution. The ascendance of far-right leaders who have expressed nostalgia for the fascist period in Italy — which nearly spelled the near destruction of Italian Jewry — has Italy’s present-day Jewish community worried.
“Today we celebrate the 75th anniversary of the promulgation of the Republican Constitution, the affirmation of our anti-fascist democracy,” Noemi Di Segni, president of the Union of Italian Jewish Communities, said on Tuesday in an op-ed in La Repubblica. “Yet there are those who believe they are celebrating another anniversary, that of the foundation of the MSI, a party which, after the fall of the fascist regime, placed itself in ideological and political continuity with the RSI, the government of diehard fascists who actively collaborated for the deportation of Italian Jews.”
Ruth Dureghello, president of the Jewish Community of Rome, wrote a critical statement of her own.
“The Italian Republic is anti-fascist and when one swears on the Constitution, it should be done knowing that there can no longer be ambiguity or inconsistency in this matter,” she wrote. “The Social Movement claimed the experience of the RSI [Fascist Italy under Mussolini], while for Italians the only model to aspire to is that of the anti-fascist movements which with their sacrifice have freed Italy from the Nazi-fascist yoke.”
La Russa took office as Senate president in October, after the victory of a right-wing coalition gave his Brothers of Italy (FDI) party a plurality in the senate and made Giorgia Meloni prime minister.
Though La Russa founded FDI alongside Meloni in 2012, he spent much of his early career in politics as a part of MSI — which was co-founded by his father in 1946 — until its dissolution in 1995. For most of its history, MSI branded itself as the defender of Italy’s fascist history, even long after the death of dictator Benito Musolini.
FDI is seen by many as MSI’s successor in Italy, even incorporating the defunct party’s tri-color flame in its own logo.
‘With all due respect to his family affections, the honorable La Russa has not yet understood that he is the President of the Senate of the anti-fascist Republic and not the head of the youth organization of the MSI. His post is a disgrace to democratic institutions,” said Gianfranco Pagliarulo, national president of ANPI, an organization devoted to veterans of Italy’s anti-fascist resistance, according to La Pressa.
Meloni was also linked to the MSI in her early years in politics. Critics say she has emboldened fascist sympathizers, and last month photos of one of her appointed ministers wearing a Nazi armband over a decade ago sparked controversy.
“Faced with the prospect of a prime minister that is affiliated with a party that ideologically is the heir of the Italian Social Movement, a good part of Italian Jews are concerned,” David Fiorentini, president of Italy’s Jewish Youth group, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in September.
Nonetheless, Meloni has attempted to make overtures to the Jewish community. In November, she met with the World Jewish Congress as well as Italian Jewish Leaders, where she discussed antisemitism and, according to her office, gave a statement which “underlined the essential importance of Jewish communities for the Italian and European national identity.”
Like other far-right leaders in Europe, she has frequently pointed to her support of the state of Israel and compared herself and FDI to Benjamin Netanyahu’s Likud Party.
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The post Italian Jewish leaders condemn parliament president for honoring neo-Fascist party appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Quiz: For America 250, how well do you know U.S. Jewish history?
The Forward produced The Great American Jewish History Quiz! using Claude, a generative artificial intelligence tool by Anthropic. All questions and answers were researched and written by Louis Keene, who prompted Claude to create the user interface and underlying code and to track statistics.
Questions or feedback? Send us an email: forwardquiz@forward.com.
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Mazel tov, Taylor and Travis: A rabbi’s imagined wedding speech under the celebrity chuppah
I have to admit, as a rabbi, I never imagined I’d be standing at a wedding bringing together two of America’s great religions: football and Taylor Swift.
And yet here we are. I’ve officiated weddings in synagogues, in backyards, on beaches. I was not prepared for Madison Square Garden.
Before I get to the blessings, I need to share a little Torah with you. Don’t worry: I’ll keep it short. Half this room is Swifties and half is Chiefs fans, and the only thing you agree on is that you didn’t come here for a sermon.
The very first matchmaking story in the Torah involves a man named Eliezer, sent by the patriarch Abraham on a mission: find a wife for Abraham’s son Isaac. Eliezer travels far, he arrives at a well, and he devises a test. A test that looked past beauty, past pedigree, past fame, past achievement.
The test is simple: When a stranger arrives tired and thirsty, what do you do?
Rebecca does more than just offer water to Eliezer. She sees his camels are also thirsty, and without being asked, she waters every single one. Ten camels. Anyone who has ever watered a camel knows this is not a small thing.
And the Torah stops to tell us: this is the wife for Isaac.
The Torah could have stopped to admire her talent or her beauty. Instead, it stopped to admire her kindness. Because she saw need in the world and responded to it, just because that’s who she was.
Taylor and Travis, I think about that story when I think about the two of you. Because what we know about you isn’t just about the Grammys or the Super Bowls. It’s about the friendships. It’s about the family. It’s the way Travis’s eyes light up when he talks about his brother Jason. It’s the way Taylor has shown up, year after year, for her crew — the people who have been with her since the beginning, long before the sold-out stadiums.
These are people who know how to love. Eliezer traveled hundreds of miles looking for exactly that. Turns out it was worth the trip.
Red zones and red carpets
Now, because we have a professional athlete here, permit me a football analogy.
Every great quarterback needs protection from a tight end like Travis. Every championship team depends on its offensive line. The line doesn’t get the glory. They don’t score the touchdowns. But without them, nothing works.
Marriage is the same. Protect one another. Protect each other’s dignity. Protect each other’s dreams. Protect each other’s hearts. Be each other’s offensive line on the hard days.
And because we also have one of the greatest songwriters in history standing before me — someone who has written the soundtrack to a generation — permit me a music analogy as well.
Every beautiful song has both melody and rhythm. Sometimes one instrument leads. Sometimes another does. But what makes the song truly beautiful is that each makes room for the other. The goal is never the solo. The goal is the harmony.
Marriage is exactly the same. There will be seasons when one of you carries more. Seasons when one of you needs extra support. Seasons of celebration and seasons of challenge. The goal is to reflect each other’s light. The goal is to create something together that neither of you could have created alone.
So, Taylor and Travis, here is my blessing for you: May you always remember what drew you to each other, the soul beneath the spotlight. May you protect each other fiercely and gently, in the stadiums and in the quiet rooms where no one is watching. May you make room for one another — to lead and to follow, season by season, era by era.
And may the love you build together — the real love, the private love, the love that has absolutely nothing to do with cameras or crowds — be the greatest thing either of you ever creates.
Mazel tov.
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The 50 most interesting Jews in American history you’ve probably never heard of
The United States is turning 250 years old. You know the stories of many of the Jews who have helped to shape the country’s history and culture, including such luminaries as Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel, Philip Roth and Barbra Streisand.
But behind the American Jewish names we know and revere are the stories of many other American Jews who influenced the nation — and whose lives reflected the country’s efforts to realize its founding promises — who have found less purchase in history’s spotlight. To celebrate the 250th anniversary of this country’s founding, we’ve collected 50 of those stories here.
Among their number are scientists, athletes, lawmakers, clergymen and a couple genuine American characters — the type of people who, no matter where they were born, ended up living lives that speak to the best of what the U.S. has to offer its citizens.
As one of our honorees, the author Edna Ferber, wrote: “America — rather, the United States — seems to me to be the Jew among the nations. It is resourceful, adaptable, maligned, envied, feared, imposed upon. It is warmhearted, overfriendly; quick-witted, lavish, colorful; given to extravagant speech and gestures. Its people are travelers and wanderers by nature, moving, shifting, restless; swarming in Fords, in ocean liners; craving entertainment; volatile. The schnuckle among the nations of the world.”
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