Author: Oriana Fallaci
Publication: Corriere della Sera
Date: December 2, 2002
URL: http://www.frontpagemagazine.com/Articles/Printable.asp?ID=4830
[A French court on Nov. 20, 2002,
dismissed a request to ban "The Rage and the Pride," the best-selling book
by
[leftist] Italian journalist Oriana
Fallaci that critics say incites hatred of Muslims. Fallaci, 73, is a former
Resistance fighter and war correspondent best-known for her uncompromising
interviews with world leaders]
I find it shameful that in Italy
there should be a procession of individuals dressed as suicide bombers
who spew vile abuse at Israel, hold up photographs of Israeli leaders on
whose foreheads they have drawn the swastika, incite people to hate the
Jews. And who, in order to see Jews once again in the extermination camps,
in the gas chambers, in the ovens of Dachau and Mauthausen and Buchenwald
and Bergen-Belsen et cetera, would sell their own mother to a harem.
I find it shameful that the Catholic
Church should permit a bishop, one with lodgings in the Vatican no less,
a saintly man who was found in Jerusalem with an arsenal of arms and explosives
hidden in the secret compartments of his sacred Mercedes, to participate
in that procession and plant himself in front of a microphone to thank
in the name of God the suicide bombers who massacre the Jews in pizzerias
and supermarkets. To call them "martyrs who go to their deaths as to a
party."
I find it shameful that in France,
the France of Liberty-Equality-Fraternity, they burn synagogues, terrorize
Jews, profane their cemeteries. I find it shameful that the youth of Holland
and Germany and Denmark flaunt the kaffiah just as Mussolini's avant garde
used to flaunt the club and the fascist badge.
I find it shameful that in nearly
all the universities of Europe Palestinian students sponsor and nurture
anti-Semitism. That in Sweden they asked that the Nobel Peace Prize given
to Shimon Peres in 1994 be taken back and conferred on the dove with the
olive branch in his mouth, that is on Arafat. I find it shameful that the
distinguished members of the Committee, a Committee that (it would appear)
rewards political color rather than merit, should take this request into
consideration and even respond to it. In hell the Nobel Prize honors he
who does not receive it.
I find it shameful (we're back in
Italy) that state-run television stations contribute to the resurgent anti-Semitism,
crying only over Palestinian deaths while playing down Israeli deaths,
glossing over them in unwilling tones. I find it shameful that in their
debates they host with much deference the scoundrels with turban or kaffiah
who yesterday sang hymns to the slaughter at New York and today sing hymns
to the slaughters at Jerusalem, at Haifa, at Netanya, at Tel Aviv.
I find it shameful that the press
does the same, that it is indignant because Israeli tanks surround the
Church of the Nativity in Bethlehem, that it is not indignant because inside
that same church two hundred Palestinian terrorists well armed with machine
guns and munitions and explosives (among them are various leaders of Hamas
and Al-Aqsa) are not unwelcome guests of the monks (who then accept bottles
of mineral water and jars of honey from the soldiers of those tanks).
I find it shameful that, in giving
the number of Israelis killed since the beginning of the Second Intifada
(four hundred twelve), a noted daily newspaper found it appropriate to
underline in capital letters that more people are killed in their traffic
accidents. (Six hundred a year).
I find it shameful that the Roman
Observer, the newspaper of the Pope--a Pope who not long ago left in the
Wailing Wall a letter of apology for the Jews--accuses of extermination
a people who were exterminated in the millions by Christians. By Europeans.
I find it shameful that this newspaper denies to the survivors of that
people (survivors who still have numbers tattooed on their arms) the right
to react, to defend themselves, to not be exterminated again.
I find it shameful that in the name
of Jesus Christ (a Jew without whom they would all be unemployed), the
priests of our parishes or Social Centers or whatever they are flirt with
the assassins of those in Jerusalem who cannot go to eat a pizza or buy
some eggs without being blown up.
I find it shameful that they are
on the side of the very ones who inaugurated terrorism, killing us on airplanes,
in airports, at the Olympics, and who today entertain themselves by killing
western journalists. By shooting them, abducting them, cutting their throats,
decapitating them. (There's someone in Italy who, since the appearance
of Anger and Pride, would like to do the same to me. Citing verses of the
Koran he exorts his "brothers" in the mosques and the Islamic Community
to chastise me in the name of Allah. To kill me. Or rather to die with
me. Since he's someone who speaks English well, I'll respond to him in
English: "F*** you.")
I find it shameful that almost all
of the left, the left that twenty years ago permitted one of its union
processionals to deposit a coffin (as a mafioso warning) in front of the
synagogue of Rome, forgets the contribution made by the Jews to the fight
against fascism. Made by Carlo and Nello Rossini, for example, by Leone
Ginzburg, by Umberto Terracini, by Leo Valiani, by Emilio Sereni, by women
like my friend Anna Maria Enriques Agnoletti who was shot at Florence on
June 12, 1944, by seventy-five of the three-hundred-thirty-five people
killed at the Fosse Ardeatine, by the infinite others killed under torture
or in combat or before firing squads. (The companions, the teachers, of
my infancy and my youth.)
I find it shameful that in part
through the fault of the left--or rather, primarily through the fault of
the left (think of the left that inaugurates its congresses applauding
the representative of the PLO, leader in Italy of the Palestinians who
want the destruction of Israel)--Jews in Italian cities are once again
afraid. And in French cities and Dutch cities and Danish cities and German
cities, it is the same. I find it shameful that Jews tremble at the passage
of the scoundrels dressed like suicide bombers just as they trembled during
Krystallnacht, the night in which Hitler gave free rein to the Hunt of
the Jews.
I find it shameful that in obedience
to the stupid, vile, dishonest, and for them extremely advantageous fashion
of Political Correctness the usual opportunists--or better the usual parasites--exploit
the word Peace. That in the name of the word Peace, by now more debauched
than the words Love and Humanity, they absolve one side alone of its hate
and bestiality. That in the name of a pacifism (read conformism) delegated
to the singing crickets and buffoons who used to lick Pol Pot's feet they
incite people who are confused or ingenuous or intimidated. Trick them,
corrupt them, carry them back a half century to the time of the yellow
star on the coat. These charlatans who care about the Palestinians as much
as I care about the charlatans. That is not at all.
I find it shameful that many Italians
and many Europeans have chosen as their standard-bearer the gentleman (or
so it is polite to say) Arafat. This nonentity who thanks to the money
of the Saudi Royal Family plays the Mussolini ad perpetuum and in his megalomania
believes he will pass into History as the George Washington of Palestine.
This ungrammatical wretch who when I interviewed him was unable even to
put together a complete sentence, to make articulate conversation. So that
to put it all together, write it, publish it, cost me a tremendous effort
and I concluded that compared to him even Ghaddafi sounds like Leonardo
da Vinci. This false warrior who always goes around in uniform like Pinochet,
never putting on civilian garb, and yet despite this has never participated
in a battle. War is something he sends, has always sent, others to do for
him. That is, the poor souls who believe in him. This pompous incompetent
who playing the part of Head of State caused the failure of the Camp David
negotiations, Clinton's mediation. No-no-I-want-Jerusalem-all-to-myself.
This eternal liar who has a flash of sincerity only when (in private) he
denies Israel's right to exist, and who as I say in my book contradicts
himself every five minutes. He always plays the double-cross, lies even
if you ask him what time it is, so that you can never trust him. Never!
With him you will always wind up systematically betrayed. This eternal
terrorist who knows only how to be a terrorist (while keeping himself safe)
and who during the Seventies, that is when I interviewed him, even trained
the terrorists of Baader-Meinhof. With them, children ten years of age.
Poor children. (Now he trains them to become suicide bombers. A hundred
baby suicide bombers are in the works: a hundred!). This weathercock who
keeps his wife at Paris, served and revered like a queen, and keeps his
people down in the s***. He takes them out of the s*** only to send them
to die, to kill and to die, like the eighteen year old girls who in order
to earn equality with the fate of their victims. And yet many Italians
love him, yes. Just like they loved Mussolini. And many other Europeans
do the same.
I find it shameful and see in all
this the rise of a new fascism, a new nazism. A fascism, a nazism, that
much more grim and revolting because it is conducted and nourished by those
who hypocritically pose as do-gooders, progressives, communists, pacifists,
Catholics or rather Christians, and who have the gall to label a warmonger
anyone like me who screams the truth. I see it, yes, and I say the following.
I have never been tender with the tragic and Shakespearean figure Sharon.
("I know you've come to add another scalp to your necklace," he murmured
almost with sadness when I went to interview him in 1982.) I have often
had disagreements with the Israelis, ugly ones, and in the past I have
defended the Palestinians a great deal. Maybe more than they deserved.
But I stand with Israel, I stand with the Jews. I stand just as I stood
as a young girl during the time when I fought with them, and when the Anna
Marias were shot. I defend their right to exist, to defend themselves,
to not let themselves be exterminated a second time. And disgusted by the
anti-Semitism of many Italians, of many Europeans, I am ashamed of this
shame that dishonors my Country and Europe. At best, it is not a community
of States, but a pit of Pontius Pilates. And even if all the inhabitants
of this planet were to think otherwise, I would continue to think so.