The Reaction to Zionism in Mussolini’s Italy: The Case of Left-Wing Political Parties

During the fascist regime the Italian reaction towards Zionism was ambivalent. As we will see in this chapter, Benito Mussolini had an oscillating attitude. In 1935 he took an openly hostile stance, three years before the passing of the anti-Jewish legislation, in 1938. The Italian anti-fascist left, while fighting for survival, did not consider Zionism as a solution and did not think about the persecution of Jews as a priority problem. During the period between the two World Wars, Marxists stopped caring about the Jewish question. Socialists and communists favoured complete assimilation, supporting the idea that Jews should be fully integrated into nation states. They saw anti-Semitism as a barbaric remnant of the past, ‘a vicious form of cultural regression used by the ruling classes to divert the proletariat from its true objectives’. In any case, they thought that the victory of revolution would liquidate the scourge of anti-Semitism and make the existence of Zionism useless. In this chapter, after having summarize the Italian reaction towards Zionism before Balfour declaration, we will see the official position of fascism and the different reactions of the Italian left. This chapter argues that Zionism was opposed by both fascists and anti- fascists.