******************** POSTING RULES & NOTES ******************** #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. *****************************************************************
One journalist who not only told the truth about Matteotti was Sylvia Pankhurst. She not only wrote about his murder, she create a Matteotti Defense Committee, raised money for his family. Writing in 1919, she also was one of the first non-Italian journalists to systematically warn about the dangers of Mussolini. See Barbara Winslow, *Sylvia Pankhurst: Sexual Politics and Political Activism.* *Barbara Winslow* *RESIST AND PERSIST!!!* cell and text: 212-8449447 Author: *Shirley Chisholm: Catalyst for Change*, Westview Press, NY 2014 available on Amazon in Kindle and book Follow me on twitter: @bwpurplewins instagram: @bwpurplewins On Wed, Oct 24, 2018 at 9:30 AM Louis Proyect via Marxism < [email protected]> wrote: > ******************** POSTING RULES & NOTES ******************** > #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. > #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. > #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. > ***************************************************************** > > NY Times Op-Ed, Oct. 24, 2018 > What a Murder by Mussolini Teaches Us About Khashoggi and M.B.S. > > The murder of Jamal Khashoggi by the Saudis has striking parallels with > the murder of the Italian socialist leader Giacomo Matteotti by Fascist > thugs. > > By Alexander Stille > > (Mr. Stille teaches journalism at Columbia University.) > > In the weeks after the murder of Jamal Khashoggi by Saudi agents in > Istanbul, a question has been repeatedly asked: How could the Saudi > crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, be so reckless as to sanction this > horrifying murder carried out in such a clumsy and shameless fashion? > > The answer, I think, is that dictatorships are inherently obtuse. > Dictators live in their own self-created bubble of adulation and > impunity, which leads them to huge misjudgments when they are forced to > act outside of the bubble. > > The premeditated and coldblooded murder of Mr. Khashoggi by the Saudis > has striking parallels with the premeditated and coldblooded murder of > the Italian socialist leader Giacomo Matteotti by Fascist thugs > operating on the orders of Benito Mussolini. > > On the afternoon of June 10, 1924, Mr. Matteotti was walking in Rome > when a group of Fascists grabbed him and stuffed him into a waiting car. > Two months later, his decomposed body was found about 12 miles away. > > Several days before his abduction, Mr. Matteotti had delivered an > impassioned speech denouncing widespread fraud and violence committed by > the Fascists during national elections two months earlier. He was > scheduled to give another speech when Parliament reopened the day after > his disappearance. > > The murder of a prominent critic of Fascism shocked Italy and the world. > Before Mr. Matteotti’s disappearance and murder, Italy’s democratic > allies had been prepared to believe that despite Mussolini’s violent > rise to power, he intended to respect the rules and freedoms of > parliamentary democracy. > > For some months, while an official investigation took place, Mussolini’s > political survival as the prime minister seemed to hang in the balance, > as evidence accumulated that Mr. Matteotti’s killers were part of a hit > squad operating under the control and acting on the orders of the prime > minister’s office. > > Mussolini survived the crisis because of the weakness and division of > his political opposition, because Victor Emmanuel III, Italy’s king, who > had invited Mussolini to form a government, was reluctant to risk a > “leap in the dark” by demanding his resignation. > > Mussolini was also saved by the complicity of foreign allies and > international public opinion to accept the implausible explanation that > Mr. Matteotti’s killers were Fascist hotheads who had acted on the spur > of the moment, to “teach him a lesson,” and killed him accidentally. > > Then, as now, there were even powerful oil interests in the affair — > possible payments to Mussolini’s brother Arnaldo Mussolini, the Jared > Kushner figure of the situation — that contributed to the consensus to > “get over” the brutal killing. > > Then too, the reaction of near-universal horror to the Matteotti killing > was surprising since violence had been a consistent feature of Fascism. > The thugs who killed Mr. Matteotti had already used violence, > intimidation and fraud during the 1924 elections that gave Mussolini a > majority in Parliament. The world — and most middle-class Italians — > credited Mussolini with preventing a Bolshevik-style revolution in Italy > and was prepared to overlook what it took to be a little residual > violence that it assumed would fade away after Mussolini started wearing > the bowler hat and spats of a respectable politician. > > Italy was still a half-functioning democracy, and that helped expose the > murder and the lies deployed during the attempts at a cover-up. > Eyewitness had seen Mr. Matteotti being forced into a car. An elderly > couple had seen the killers’ Lancia automobile as they staked out Mr. > Matteotti’s house in the days before the kidnapping and wrote down the > license plate. > > The police found the car’s upholstery covered in Mr. Matteotti’s blood. > He had been stabbed repeatedly and his body mutilated. A comparatively > independent initial investigation linked the killers to Mussolini’s > office, where one of his top aides, Cesare Rossi, directed his press > office and ran Ceka Fascista, the private hit squad named after Cheka, > the Bolshevik predecessor of the K.G.B. > > Mr. Matteotti was killed before his parliamentary speech because he had > been gathering evidence and planning to expose corruption in the > assigning of a major oil concession by Mussolini’s highly personalized > government to an American company, Sinclair Oil. > > Mussolini got the case transferred to more cooperative investigators who > concluded that the Matteotti killing had been unplanned and involuntary. > The passage of time, the dithering of the Italian political class, the > self-interest of foreign governments and the complicity of the > international press helped Mussolini survive. > > A remarkable new book, “La Scoperta dell’Italia,” by the Italian > historian Mauro Canali, describes how the Fascists manipulated foreign > journalists during the Matteotti crisis. At the time, two of the most > important media outlets in Italy, The Associated Press and The New York > Times, were locally headed by a father-son team, Salvatore and Arnaldo > Cortesi, who were Italian citizens and ardent Fascist supporters. > > Mr. Rossi, the Mussolini aide who directed the hit squad, fled to Paris, > and to avoid taking the fall for the murder, he offered The New York > Times documentation implicating Mussolini. But the paper refused the > offer both because Mr. Rossi wanted $15,000 in return and because the > journalists were reluctant to accept the notion of Mussolini as a > political assassin. > > Mr. Rossi made a deal with The New York World, and Arnaldo Cortesi > published a long piece in The Times attempting to deflect blame from > Mussolini and discredit the Rossi revelations. His piece ran with the > headline “Rossi ‘Revelations’ Fall Flat in Italy; Why Former Associate’s > Charges Against Mussolini in the Matteotti Murder Failed. Premeditation > Disproved.” > > And soon, most of the world was happy to move on and do business with > Mussolini, who proceeded to consolidate his dictatorship. Getting away > with murder wasn’t good for Mussolini or Italy, feeding his sense of > dangerous omnipotence. While he was extremely shrewd in judging and > dealing with his internal opponents, he made one catastrophic mistake > after the other in foreign policy. He vastly underestimated England and > the United States, failed to listen to his advisers about the > unpreparedness of Italy’s war machine and believed his own rhetoric > about Italy’s being a nation of “eight million bayonets.” Dictators > rarely end well. > > This might offer lessons as to why the Saudis had the chutzpah to murder > Mr. Khashoggi in Istanbul. The Congress and the global press must avoid > the mistakes made during the Matteotti affair. > > A paunchy, middle-aged journalist does not take on 15 Saudi agents in a > fistfight, and you don’t bring a forensic doctor and a bone saw to the > interrogation of a political dissident. If Mr. Khashoggi had been killed > accidentally, the Saudis could hand over his body and it would come out > in an autopsy. The Saudi failure to produce his body is a virtual > admission of premeditated murder. > > Alexander Stille, a professor of journalism at Columbia University, is > the author of “Benevolence and Betrayal: Five Italian Jewish Families > Under Fascism.” > > _________________________________________________________ > Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm > Set your options at: > http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/bwpurplewins%40gmail.com _________________________________________________________ Full posting guidelines at: http://www.marxmail.org/sub.htm Set your options at: http://lists.csbs.utah.edu/options/marxism/archive%40mail-archive.com
