One historian maintained,. By confining analysis to the period of the German occupation in —5, which saw the deportation of Italian Jews to death camps, historians largely excluded from scrutiny a distinct phase in the persecution of Italian Jewry — the period of state-sponsored Italian anti-Semitism.
During the years —43, prior to the loss of Italian sovereignty, Fascist Italy waged a debilitating campaign against its Jewish population. The passage of anti-Jewish laws, introduced primarily before the Second World War and without German interference, dealt a sharp blow to the Italian Jewish community. Soon after the Manifesto of Racist Scientists appeared, which attempted to prepare the public and provide a theoretical justification for the coming anti-Jewish campaign, a law of September 5, , declared that Jews could no longer send their children to public or private Italian schools or be employed in any capacity in any Italian school from kindergarten to university; 7 a law of November 15, , further decreed the immediate and permanent removal of all textbooks by Jewish authors from the Italian classroom.
Two months later, the Council of Ministers passed a sweeping set of racial decrees. On June 29, , a new law banned Jews from the skilled professions, affecting some 1, Jewish doctors, lawyers, architects, journalists, dentists, and engineers.
On the eve of the racial laws in , the Italian Jewish population of approximately 46, 13 had been highly integrated into the general society, was overwhelmingly urban, and, on the whole, was solidly middle class.
In the mids, In contrast, about half of the general population in was employed in agriculture, 8. The contrast between the Roman Jews and other major Jewish centers can be illustrated by the divergent rates of intermarriage. Although the percentage of Jews marrying outside the faith in interwar Italy was The immediate effect of the racial laws was the abrupt disruption of jobs and education. Within weeks of the racial laws, many Jews were fired from their jobs, including over Jewish elementary school principals and teachers, Jewish high school principals and teachers, 96 tenured professors, university adjuncts, and several dozen part-time faculty.
In an effort to circumvent the anti-Semitic decrees, it is estimated that between 4, and 5, Italian Jews formally left the Jewish community in the years —41, either through conversion or officially removing their names from the registry books of the Union of Italian Israelite Communities, a number that reached close to 6, by the period —5.
The first historian to draw attention to the severity of Italian race laws was the internationally renowned Italian scholar Renzo De Felice — He documented not only the degree of Fascist complicity with Nazi Germany but also the widespread confiscation of Jewish property by Italian authorities during the German occupation.
The concentration camp of San Sabba in Trieste was the only camp in Italy with a crematorium. The Racial Laws were first abolished in the south of Italy in October-November under pressure from the American occupying forces. At the same time, the government of the Italian Social Republic headed by Mussolini expanded them with harsher measures and the order to arrest and send to concentration camps all Jews present in central and northern Italy. The laws were fully repealed by the post-war democratic government in In the short-lived liberal period between the unification of Italy and the rise of the fascist dictatorship, Jews lived in Italy as equal citizens who enjoyed freedom and reached prosperity and prestige.
However, over three centuries of theological anti-Judaism and social segregation, were not wiped off overnight. Italy had been the last stronghold of ghettos and forced conversions. In addition, the Italian society embraced popularized forms of eugenic and racial theories, at that time pervasive in Europe and the US.
Their influence increased between the colonial enterprises of the early 20th century and the invasion of Ethiopia in Beginning in the s, political and biological anti-Semitism surfaced to various degrees in sectors of the Italian society, press and political life.
The career of Giovanni Preziosi, a former priest who debuted as journalist in fascist fringe publications and became Minister of propaganda in the Italian Social Republic is emblematic of this course of events.
The pact of alliance between the Vatican and the fascist regime, by which Catholicism became the official state religion, represented another set-back from the emancipation period. The pact remapped the legal and civil status of Italian Jews and provided the blueprints of their separation from the Catholic majority.
As shown by historian Michele Sarfatti, Italian state antisemitism developed through three phases: the attack on equality in the late s-early s; the attack on rights with the Racial Laws in and the attack on lives conducted from September under the Italian Social Republic. During the period of the Italian Social Republic, many Jews who were trying to hide received help from civilians, clergy, antifascists and civil servants who, as in other European countries, often risked their lives to extend assistance.
At the same time, the Italian police were releasing census data to the Germans and many civilians were denouncing Jewish families for a fee. According to data collected by the main research center in the field, the CDEC in Milan, half of the known arrests of Jews were carried out directly by Italian police and militia. Between these two extremes were civilians willing to render certain services to Jews in hiding or en route to freedom by purchasing and selling goods, or by offering transportation and protection for remunerations that ranged from a reasonable exchange to the ruthless exploitation of people who had no other option.
A considerable percentage of this group made illegal crossings over the Italian-Swiss border. Some were hidden by friends in convents or city hospitals while others fled to the countryside and found refuge in stables and farmhouses.
In many instances, Jewish individuals and families on the run not only had to find places to hide but needed to cover the costs of their precarious lodging, which meant the mobilization of non-Jews became key to their survival. They provided housing, food, information and money; and some municipal employees and antifascist networks also provided blank or false identity cards. The main rescue and assistance operation in Italy — as well as the most extensive — was organized by the Jewish relief agency Delasem Delegazione Assistenza Emigranti , funded by well-to-do Italian families and, in proportions that increased substantially from , by the American Joint Distribution Committee.
The leaders of Delasem identified some individuals outside the Jewish community network willing to support their operation. When, in , the organization was forced to go underground, a handful of them became key figures to carry on relief and rescue operations.
These clergymen had been called upon by Delasem, whose leaders included Lelio Valobra, Raffaele Cantoni, Berl Grosser, Settimio Sorani, and Massimo Teglio who could no longer operate officially; and Rabbi Riccardo Pacifici and Rabbi Nathan Cassuto, both of whom were denounced and deported to Auschwitz while working to save lives. After the war, all of them stated to have acted independently of any higher directions. No other operation of mass rescue and assistance of the Jews in Italy has been documented.
The Dodecanese was in every respect Italian territory. It was run by a Governor whose decrees were effectively Italian law, and it was managed by the Italian administration.
The courts, schools and dominant culture were Italian and even the toponymy of Rhodes had been adapted and modified to accommodate the new regime in , with towns and villages bearing the names of Italian personalities of note. Many Dodecanese Jews had chosen Italian citizenship the so-called small citizenship after the Lausanne Treaty in From a political standpoint, the Dodecanese became an Italian territory under German military occupation on September 8, However, the civil administration remained in the hands of the Italians.
Ready to get tough with us? So now we have a request. But as the journalism we do is costly, we invite readers for whom The Times of Israel has become important to help support our work by joining The Times of Israel Community. Italian civilians are arrested in Rome by German soldiers following a partisan attack on Nazi forces during World War II public domain.
The Italian transit camp Fossoli, a site of imprisonment for Italian Jews about to be deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau, where almost all of them were murdered upon arrival, public domain.
Illustrative: Benito Mussolini and Adolf Hitler during a parade celebrating their alliance public domain.
Newsletter email address Get it By signing up, you agree to the terms. Mussolini and Hitler during a parade celebrating their alliance public domain.
0コメント