Writer Davide Picardo: Italians stand with Palestine despite the biases of the elites

Italian researcher and journalist Davide Picardo previously served as president of the Coordination of Islamic Associations in Milan (Al Jazeera)

"He is not an imam but he has a great influence among the Muslims of Italy, his name is Davide Picardo and he says that Hamas is a resistance movement."

This is how Italian journalists Claudio Antonelli and Salvatore Drago described it shortly after announcing his full support for the Islamic Resistance Movement (Hamas) in a stand that denies all "friends of Palestine" in Italy the right of Palestinians to armed resistance.

He is the son of the translator of the Holy Quran into Italian, Roberto Hamza Picardo, and the former president of the Coordination of Islamic Associations in Milan.

Davide Picardo currently runs the magazine "La Lucce" and has recently been unique in the dialogue of the leader of Hamas, Bassem Naim, at the height of the Israeli war on Gaza and incitement to Palestinian resistance in the Italian media, and hosted by Al Jazeera Net on the issues of Palestine and the relationship between the Arab and European worlds:

• You are the only journalist in Italy who interviewed a Hamas leader since the beginning of the aggression on Gaza, despite the unannounced ban on the faces of the movement in the Western media in general, and even went on to consider Hamas a liberation resistance movement. Didn't you worry about being accused of promoting "terrorists", especially after the widespread condemnation of Hamas in Italy after the October 7 attack from both left-wing and right-wing circles, and above all the official designation of the movement by the European Union as a terrorist organization?

It is true that the political and media debate in Italy is not free – contrary to all claims – which has created a rift between the elites and the Italian people, who stand with the Palestinians despite the complete media bias in favor of Israel.

The political and media debate in Italy is not free – contrary to all claims – which has created a rift between the elites and the Italian people, who stand with the Palestinians despite the complete media bias in favor of Israel.

We in the magazine "La Luce" chose the class of peoples to describe the free media, and if there is a conflict somewhere, there is no sense in obfuscating one of the parties to the conflict. The demonization of Hamas and the attempt to dehumanize it through the policy of blackout means that there are those who fear the voice of a party that would influence public opinion with its rational proposal that may destroy the logic of genocide in Haunted Gaza with monsters that threaten the very existence of the West, according to the "mainstream" media. While we are facing a people who defend themselves from a brutal occupation.

Our interview was a scoop that no major media outlet in Italy dared to republish. As for the charge of promoting terrorism, the EU's decision is political and has no legal basis.

If we consider armed resistance against occupation to be terrorism, then we must retroactively denounce all national liberation movements that history has known.

If we consider armed resistance against occupation to be terrorism, then we must retroactively denounce all national liberation movements that history has known. Indeed, as the whole world sees today, actual terrorism is what Israel practices against the Palestinians, not what Hamas does.

• We noticed that, despite everything, Italy did not adopt the exceptional measures taken by France, Germany and Britain in dealing with demonstrators or Hamas sympathizers. What makes Italy so politically moderate in its stance on the Palestinian issue? Here, it is necessary to mention the position of the ruling "Brothers of Italy" party – led by Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni – and "Forza Italia" – founded by the late Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, and currently headed by Foreign Minister Antonio Tajani – and both parties refused to join the "major" demonstration called by right-wing minister Matteo Salvini on November 4 in support of Israel, their coalition partner (for the Northern League party). Are there cultural roots to this position?

Italy has a well-established tradition in relations with the Arab and Muslim world. This is the country of the late politician Enrico Mattei, who stood with the Algerian Liberation Revolution and supported the FLN against French colonialism, and it later cost him his life.

It is the country of politician and parliamentarian Betino Craxi, Arafat's personal friend who defended the Palestinians' right to resort to armed resistance. It is the country of former President Sandro Petrini, who denounced the Sabra and Shatila massacres in the harshest terms, as well as the country of veteran politicians Aldo Moro and Giulio Andreotti, who managed to maintain balanced relations with the Arab world.

In the Second Republic, Italy also knew two great political leaders, one from the right and the other from the left, Silvio Berlusconi and Massimo D'Alema, both of whom knew how to maintain privileged relations with the Arab world. This history has created something resembling Italy's DNA imprint in its relations with Arab countries, in addition to the factor of geographical proximity, Italy is keen to be a bridge on the Mediterranean between the Arab world and Europe.

Despite Meloni's kneeling stances in determining its foreign policies, as has been evident on more than one occasion, it cannot ignore history, geography or even demography in formulating its position on the Arab and Muslim world.

Despite Meloni's kneeling stances in determining its foreign policies, as has been evident on more than one occasion, it cannot ignore history, geography or even demography in formulating its position on the Arab and Muslim world. At the November 4 demonstration to which I referred, only 500 people, most of them elderly, responded to the call of right-wing minister Salvini, while Milan was counting 30,<> people demonstrating in support of Palestine, most of them Italian Muslim youth. These are all data that the competent authorities do not overlook when determining the geopolitical position of the country.

• The editorial I wrote on October 27 in La Luce was titled: "Palestine's Enemies and Fake Friends: Italy's Propaganda Fronts." Who are Palestine's enemies and fake friends? And why did you consider that the danger of false friends is no less than that of enemies?

The outspoken enemies of Palestine are the representatives of the "institutional right" that believes that Israel is fighting its war on its behalf and on behalf of the entire West within the framework of the "clash of civilizations" theory, so we find them giving their full support to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in this "crusade that has no religion."

The outspoken enemies of Palestine are representatives of the "institutional right" that believes Israel is fighting its war on behalf of him and the entire West within the framework of the "clash of civilizations" theory.

What is remarkable here is Israel's success in presenting itself as part of the Western world, despite the fact that it is an ethnic state based on a religious vision – the same elements that the West faults the Muslim world.

On the other hand, the Italian left, which once sided with oppressed peoples and supported liberation movements from colonialism, now supports the Palestinian people only in an "abstract" way that does not lead to anything concrete, such as using the broken cylinder of the "two-state solution" to ease its conscience and shut the mouths of the Palestinians who demand that it register a position.

The Italian left, which once sided with oppressed peoples and supported decolonization movements, now supports the Palestinian people only in an "abstract" way that does not lead to anything concrete.

Personally, I think the right's position is more honorable than it is, because it sincerely supports one party, while the left still uses the phrase "two-state solution" even though it knows very well that Israel will not give the Palestinians a state.

The Palestinians, who have been abandoned by the whole world, what can they do in the face of all the injustices they face? Don't they have the right to resist? "No, they are not entitled." This is simply the answer of the left and so the mask fell off him during this aggression. If there is a right, there must be a practical mechanism for its enforcement.

The danger of the Italian left today on the Palestinian cause lies not only in the fact that it chose to sell words to Palestine, but also in its rejection of the true resistance of Palestinians, especially if they are Muslims. This is another dangerous feature of the behavior of the left, which wants Palestinians only like it, wanting "secularists, feminists, and why not transgender people either."

But the danger of the Italian left today for the Palestinian cause lies not only in the fact that it chose to sell words to Palestine, but also in its rejection of the true resistance of Palestinians, especially if they are Muslims. This is another dangerous feature of the behavior of the left, which wants Palestinians only like it, wants "secularists, feminists, and why not transgender people either," so Hamas doesn't like it.

It doesn't matter if the democracy and ballot boxes that brought Hamas to hell go. These "friends" are extremely damaging to the Palestinian cause because they falsely claim to support the struggle of the Palestinian people when in fact they are only undermining it.

Italian journalist Davide Picardo praised Italy's long-standing tradition of relations with the Arab and Muslim world (social media)

• Since you raised the topic of "gender", in Italy we have seen Muslim faces of Arab immigrant origin who side with the left in promoting gender theory. Cannot Muslims in Italy and the West in general practice politics without giving up inherent elements of their identity?

This brings us back to the dilemma of the current left, which has abandoned the real concerns of the people and their main incubator and sided with the agendas of the globalized elites. This is a phenomenon predicted by the way by the great leftist Italian poet Pier Paolo Pasolini 40 years ago. Add to it the false claim of welcoming cultures to the illusion of pluralism and acceptance of the other who does not depart from accepting the recipes of immigrants but not their vision of the world.

The leftist folkloric approach to immigration wants Muslims to engage in politics to exploit them in the media only with their Arabic names and headscarves on their head, but not before they strip themselves of their conservative traditions and everything that contradicts gender ideology.

Thus, the leftist folkloric approach to immigration wants Muslims to engage in politics to exploit them in the media only with their Arabic names and headscarves on their head, but not before they are stripped of their conservative traditions and everything that contradicts gender ideology. The Muslims of Italy will not accept these deviations again, and I confirm that things are in the process of changing.

So we are engaged in dialogue with those who defend the values we believe in on the right. It is true that it has become difficult within the recent political alignments that followed the war on Gaza, but we will determine the formations with which we deserve to open an effective dialogue.

• Talking about the "Arabic" names that the left exploits, as it says, to give the illusion of a state of cultural diversity and acceptance of the other in its institutions, on the other hand, there is talk behind the scenes of Italian universities about discrimination against Muslim professors (of Italian origin) within specific humanitarian disciplines, which push some to hide their religion so as not to hinder their careers. Since you are one of the most prominent Muslim activists in Italy – and the most influential in the description of the newspaper "La Verita" – do you not think of establishing an observatory of Islamophobia in Italy in order to identify such cases, especially since they usually affect new Muslims, who are Italians father to grandfather with Italian names and not immigrants?

Indeed, this is a very dangerous phenomenon, especially since it concerns the university, which is a strategic sector that produces knowledge and thus legitimizes power.

After the events of September 11, we witnessed the adoption of an anti-Islamic narrative that somehow aligned the university to become another ideological mouthpiece, along with the press, even though this is a field that must be a free space for the production of ideas and adhere to objectivity and scientific rigor.

This of course does not mean that the Italian university is devoid of free critical names, but recently two great academics who were forced to hide their Islam throughout their lives have already left our world because of the fear of professional persecution that they would have been subjected to if they declared Islam.

Unfortunately, at the moment, we do not have the necessary tools to address this phenomenon, especially since the basic rights that guarantee freedom of belief do not exist, so we have a lot to do.

Source : Al Jazeera