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| Anti-Israel cartoon and grave vandalism in Italy
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Fausto Bertinotti (L), President of the House of Representatives
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The debate over anti-Semitism in Italy was brought to the fore this week after 40 graves were vandalised in a Jewish cemetery days after a newspaper published a cartoon comparing Israelis to the Nazis.
Milan's chief rabbi Alfonso Arbib called the vandalism “a very serious and painful event”.
However Roberto Jarach, chairman of the 12,000-member Milan Jewish community, told EJP that the episode appears to be “purely vandalism” as no graffiti or anti-Semitic signs were found.
“It’s not a desecration but only violence against the tombstones,” he said noting that several days ago police intervened to stop Roma people from using the cemetery water.
“Maybe in a reaction they started to break the stones,” he suggested, confirming information published in La Stampa newspaper. “We have to wait until the investigation is completed,” Jarach said. “But anyway this is not a good signal,” he added.
Cartoon concern
The cartoon, printed in daily paper of the Refounded Communist Party Liberazione depicted the entrance to the Palestinian occupied territories just as Auschwitz extermination camp’s gate. In the image the separation fence was accompanied by the sign “Hunger liberates”.
The drawing provoked the harsh reaction of Israeli ambassador to Italy Ehud Gol along with that of the representatives of the Italian Jewish communities.
The diplomat protested in writing with Liberazione’s editor-in-chief Piero Sansonetti lamenting that “the cartoon disrespects the Holocaust and is deeply insulting to the victims' memory".
Gol concluded his letter requesting Sansonetti to apologise. And on May 15, Leone Paserman, chairman of Rome Jewish community –the largest in Italy- told EJP that the cartoon was simply “unacceptable”.
The director of Liberazione, Piero Sansonetti, said the cartoon was "very polemic and pro-Palestinian and “might have offended some sensitiveness”" but it was not "anti-Semitic". Bertinotti published a statement on Monday, judging it improper to implicate him in the affair.
The statement read: "But I think that in these difficult times for cultures and religions to live together we have to avoid all demonstrations, including satire, that could be perceived as offensive by the communities concerned." Political involvement
The joint Italian and Israeli pressures brought the newly elected Italian House speaker Fausto Bertinotti, formerly leader of the Re-founded Communist party (PRC), to distance himself from the cartoon.
Bertinotti published a statement, judging it improper to implicate him in the affair. The statement read: "But I think that in these difficult times for cultures and religions to live together we have to avoid all demonstrations, including satire, that could be perceived as offensive by the communities concerned."
He called “for greater respect for history and religion, in this case that of Judaism".
Lawmaker and journalist Furio Colombo, director of L'Unita - the daily paper of the ex-communist Democratic Left (DS) - said the cartoon was "offensive" and repeated "one of the worst cliches about Jews".
The PRC and the DS are both part of the new leftist majority under Romano Prodi. Italian newspapers gave a lot of coverage to the incident.
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