Italy

   Until the passage of the Italian racial laws in 1938, antiSemitism was a marginal phenomenon in Italy. In fact, many Jews had supported Benito Mussolini’s fascist movement until the mid1930s. This changed in 1938 when Mussolini succumbed to Adolf Hitler’s pressure and promulgated the “Declaration of Race,” which was ostensibly modeled after the German Nuremberg Laws but had the effect of satisfying no one, least of all the Nazis, who criticized the many exceptions in the new racial laws. Yet the racial laws were enforced and took their toll on Italy’s Jewish community. There were approximately 57,000 Jews in Italy at the time of the passage of the racial laws in 1938. Jews constituted about 1 percent of the population, and about 10,000 were refugees from Germany and Austria. The Jewish community was predominantly middle class, and thoroughly assimilated into Italian life, characterized by a growing rate of intermarriage. Thus, the passage of the anti-Jewish laws in November 1938 came as a shock to Italian Jewry. Jews were excluded from the civil service and the army, and prohibited from owning enterprises that employed large numbers of Italians. In June 1939, the government barred Jewish professionals from serving non-Jewish clients, and limitations were placed on land ownership as well as on property in general. Consequently, what had once been a prosperous community was reduced to penury.

   Jews, however, could take solace that, despite their economic, political, and social privation, the government resisted German demands to deport them. Although Mussolini was increasingly dependent on his German ally, the protection of Jews, both within the country and in Italian-occupied territories in France, Yugoslavia, and Greece, was a way in which Italy asserted its independence from its Axis partner. Combined with humanitarian concerns, Italian-occupied territories became havens of refuge for Jews. This protection, however, ended when Germany occupied Italy in September 1943. Between September and January 1944, at least 3,110 Jews were deported from Italy to Auschwitz, and an additional 4,056 arrived at the death camp a few months later as the Germans systematically deported Jews from northern and central Italy.

   Because of the assistance of ordinary Italians, however, about four fifths of Italian Jewry was saved. But it is also true that the Germans were aided by Italian collaborators in the roundup and deportation of Jews to Auschwitz. Thousands of Jews were arrested by the Italian police, and others were betrayed in exchange for monetary rewards that the Germans offered for the denunciation of Jews. Approximately 8,000 Italian Jews perished in the Holocaust.