How the horrible month of March for Meloni might change the path of Italy

A horrible March for Giorgia Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni will not forget March 2026. First, there was the aggression on Iran by the United States and Israel. The illegitimate nature of the war, its indiscriminate violence and disregard for civilian lives, and, of course, its direct repercussions on the global economy made it immediately unpopular. A recent poll on people’s perception of the war revealed that more than 80 percent of Italians are “very worried,” a percentage that rises to above 90 percent among women and youth. Moreover, although 63 percent of Italians say they are in favor of a regime change in Iran, 65 percent do not think war is the way to achieve it.  The war might have a more positive reception among voters of the government’s coalition, but the broad base of Italians does not want it. They see it as yet another symptom of the drift of the US and Israel into rogue states without any respect for international law and see that Italy should distance itself from these conditions. Since US President Donald Trump’s second election, Meloni tried to present herself as his privileged friend and his mediator with Europe. This special relationship was the subject of widespread mockery in Italy when Defense Minister Guido Crosetto was stranded in Dubai after flights were canceled at the beginning of the war in February, as apparently no one thought of informing Italy of the imminent attack. The damage has been beyond control.  Then, the referendum on constitutional amendments to the justice system came at the end of month. In theory, the referendum had nothing to do with Gaza, Palestine or Trump. Italians were called to express their opinion on one of the pillars of the current government’s program: the separation of judges and prosecutors in career paths, the splitting of the High Council of the Judiciary into two bodies and the reversal of the appointment of its members by elections. But the referendum turned into a vote on the executive.  This government is led by Meloni’s party, Fratelli d’Italia (Brothers of Italy). Founded in 2012, it is the latest version of a party established by the most irreducible fascists after World War II. At first, the party was the Movimento Sociale Italiano (Italian Social Movement), then it became Alleanza Nazionale (National Alliance). This was the result of a long process of political adaptation to gain internal and external legitimacy. The party adopted Atlanticist positions and refined its language — Benito Mussolini was a dictator, even if he also did good things and we can still put his marble bust on display.  For many, the referendum was seen as a way to say “No, basta (enough),” to this power and its allies abroad. Many “No” campaigners referred to the government’s complicities in the genocide as a reason to cast their vote. The “No” campaign was everywhere. Everyone was mobilized to go to the ballots, even though referendums in Italy traditionally have a very low turnout. In Napoli, my hometown, there was an excited tension in the air. In my building, one of the management staff, who always used to vote for Fratelli d’Italia, told me: “Of course I will vote ‘No’. She has to go.” In the neighborhood, people would stop you to ask: “Did you already vote? Don’t forget eh?”  The “No” voters won significantly, with about 54 percent of the votes and a high turnout of 56 percent, especially for a referendum which usually does not go beyond 20-30 percent.  We cannot say exactly how much the government’s stance about the war in Gaza or its proximity with Trump played a role in these results. But the fact that the last weeks ahead of the referendum coincided with the initial stages of the war on Iran contributed to putting everything in the same pot. What we know for sure is that many young people, who usually don’t go to the ballots, decided, this time, to go and voted overwhelmingly no. As the writer and journalist Christian Raimo put it in a post: “This is clearly the victory of the Gaza generation. More than 80 percent of [‘No’ voters] are under 25. They used the first available vote to say no to a fate of war and fascism.”  Meloni’s government barely absorbed the blow. Some of its members were forced to resign, and Meloni in person recognized the defeat. Fratelli d’Italia lost endorsement in the polls, and the “large camp” opposition including the Democratic Party, Alleanza Verdi e Sinistra (Greens and Left Alliance) and Movimento Cinque Stelle (Five Star Movement) is now discussing how to convince the “Gaza generation” to vote for them at the next parliamentary elections. Something quite out of the ordinary happened for the first time: a Western government paid a considerable price for its silence and support of the genocide and its perpetrators.  Let’s block everything If a referendum on internal affairs could be used as a tool to reject, among other things, the fascist, colonialist, war mongering reality that Western governments are imposing on the world against the will of their public opinions, it is because of the large mobilizations against the genocide in Gaza that took place in Italy during the last two years.  The peak was reached between the end of September and the beginning of October 2025. On 22 September, a strike called by the Unione Sindacale di Base (USB), the largest Italian grassroots union, evolved into a massive social disruption: urban public transports halted in 90 percent of the municipalities, half of the train services were suspended and major ports stopped working. The second strike, on Friday, October 3, was joined by the main Italian trade union, the Confederazione Generale Italiana del Lavoro. Two million people marched into the streets of different cities. Protesters seized railway stations, ring roads, highways and bridges. A great number of teachers, professors and doctors also took part. The entire country came to a halt, and as Federico Tomasone put it: “when labour steps onto the stage, solidarity acquires material teeth.”  The strikes were a culmination of two years of protests, and while they prepared the terrain, it was the Global Sumud  Flotilla, headed to Gaza from different locations, including Italian ports, with Italian activists on board, that gave the final push. The Genoa dockworkers of the USB launched their warning three weeks before: “If we lose contact with our boats, with our comrades, even for just 20 minutes, we will shut down all of Europe.” They maintained their promise.  The flotilla was important as it offered the occasion to re-affirm a moral agency. For once, the objective did not appear as vague and impossible but something at hand. It was fragile, problematic in some ways, but also a very tangible rope to grasp when nothing else seemed to work. The fact that 48 Italians were on the boats was a leverage for the movement, as Italy is a country that always prefers to pay the ransom if one of its citizens is kidnapped, and where the assassination of Giulio Regeni in Egypt mounted an entire national campaign that involved civil society, celebrities and politicians alike. The government’s nervousness in dealing with the flotilla was palpable, as they repeatedly begged the activists to go back and even decided to send a military ship to assist, before withdrawing it out of fear of clashing with the Israeli navy.  In the midst of all this, came the criticism of Israel by Meloni at the United Nations, on September 24, 2025, when she said in a speech that “Israel has trespassed the limit” that “infringed humanitarian law” and caused a “massacre among civilians.” On the same occasion, she stated Italy would vote favorably to some of the sanctions proposed by the European Union commission against Israel.  The rhetorical shift was substantial, even though Meloni went through the usual talking points of condemning Hamas and recognizing Israel’s right to self defense. The speech did not go unnoticed in Israel and was harshly attacked. At the end of March, her statements circulated again on social media, in the middle of the Israeli-US attack on Iran, as if to suggest Meloni’s unflinching support for Israel is weakening.  On April 13, a new series of statements gave this shift a new dimension. Meloni revealed that she decided to suspend the automatic renewal of the defense agreement between Italy and Israel, signed in 2003. The memorandum of understanding included collaboration between defense industries and import and export of military equipment. The decision came in relation to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon and the repeated attacks by Israel against UNIFIL, the international peacekeeping force established in 1978 in Lebanon, to which Italy is one of the main contributors.  Even if mostly a symbolic action, the suspension nonetheless marked a significant step for a government that, until then, was among the strongest opposers of any review of the trade agreements between Israel and the EU. The timing acquired more symbolic strength, as a few days later, a petition requesting the suspension of the agreement reached more than one million signatories, among them more than 200,000 Italians.  Almost as if to complete the picture of a possible political realignment, the same week, she labeled the attacks by Trump on Pope Leo XIV as “unacceptable.”  Italy and Palestine: an old story How is it possible that, in Italy, the opposition to the genocide could reach such magnitude and make a government tremble?  The role of young generations, in line with the global trend, was crucial. It was young people who occupied the front lines of the protests and guaranteed their continuity, because of their exposure to social media, their anti-colonial awareness (with cultural exposition that rebalanced the centrality of the Shoah), exchanges with peers coming from post-colonial contexts and the growing presence of second generation immigrants. One of the most successful Italian young musicians, Ghali, a rapper with a Tunisian background, spoke loudly against the genocide on some of the most popular national stages, such as the Sanremo Music Festival.  Leftist social centers are still relevant actors when it comes to street politics, and, because of this, they became one of the main targets of the government, with an intensification of forced evictions. In August 2025, 30 year-old Leoncavallo, one such social and cultural center in Milano was forcibly evicted, and, in December, it was the time of Askatasuna, another social center in Torino. In the case of Askatasuna, the justification for the eviction was that some of its members, during a demonstration, vandalized the offices of the daily newspaper LaStampa, which they accused of being biased against Palestinians. On February 6, 2026, a new security decree was approved, which, among other things, gives larger power to the executive branch to deal with public protests, through tougher sentencing and allowing the police to detain demonstrators without the control of judiciary  Students were also very active in organizing activities, including occupations, in dozens of schools and universities, which in many cases extended after the ceasefire in October, with continued Israeli aggression in Gaza and Lebanon. But the role of young people is only a part of the story. In Italy, solidarity with Palestine has a long history, not only among leftists, but also in a big part of the Catholic world, as well as political centrist and leftist forces.  Italy’s history with Palestine goes way back and was mirrored for many years in its diplomatic stance after World War II, which tried to distance itself from the pro-Israeli positions of the US and many of its allies. The manifestations of this posture emerged in diverse ways. Some are more folkloric, as when the Italian football national team dedicated the 1982 world cup to the victims of the Sabra and Shatila massacre in Lebanon, where pro-Israeli militias slaughtered Palestinian refugees. Other times, they were very concrete, as in 1983, when Hezbollah attacked the French and US barracks of the Multinational Force in Beirut but spared those hosting the Italian troops, as their role was considered more neutral and coherent to its peacekeeping mission.  But, probably, the episode that left a more durable effect was the Sigonella crisis in October 1985, during which Prime Minister Bettino Craxi challenged US President Ronald Reagan and rejected the extradition of armed militants of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine, who had hijacked the cruise ship Achille Lauro and killed Leon Klinghoffer, a Jewish American citizen. After moments of extreme tension (US and Italian troops confronting each other around the landed plane carrying hijackers in Sigonella airport), the four militants were all tried and convicted in Italy. Craxi’s bold stance left a longstanding trace in people’s memory. Ironically, when Meloni denied US bombers the authorization to land on March 27, in Sigonella, that very same airbase, many Italian media tried to draw a parallel with the 1985 episode. The international resonance of the event forced the Italian government to state that its move was only procedural and that there is no friction with the US administration. Bowing again to the US empire probably disappointed even some of Meloni’s core base supporters, as different members of Destra Sociale (Social Right), one of the main currents of the ex-fascist party, used to be rather pro-Palestinian (and many of them antisemitic).  Italy’s approach to Palestine changed years after. In 1994, Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi aligned the country on Atlanticist, pro-Israeli positions. After September 11, 2001, and during the second Intifada, mass media began to portray the Palestinian struggle through the lens of the war on terrorism. In 2003, Deputy Prime Minister Gianfranco Fini was the first leader with a post-fascist background to pay homage to the victims of the Shoah at the Yad Vashem in Israel. Fratelli d’Italia’s support for the Jewish state today cannot be questioned.  However, the seeds of the long history of Palestinian solidarity did not go dormant. With the genocide in Gaza, Palestinian flags popped up on the windows in the most remote villages. In 2024, on April 25, the liberation day from Nazi occupation, one of the main stages of the celebrations in Bologna displayed a large Palestinian flag in the background, and children were invited to chant solidarity songs in Arabic. In Pisa, firefighters kneeled down to pay tribute to the victims of Gaza (they were later faced with disciplinary actions by the Interior Ministry). Videos showed commuters stuck for hours in their cars by demonstrators, and, yet encouraging them to continue. Catholic humanism, traditional leftist politics and radical internationalism converged to create an atmosphere of rejection of what was happening in Gaza. Italian mass media, while at the beginning behaving as those in France or Germany in downsizing the extent of the massacres, soon adjusted themselves to the general mood, giving more space to the suffering of Palestinians. This contributed to the increased sense of rage and impotence in the face of a livestreamed genocide.  The price of silence today The sense of impotence of the masses in front of the unfolding horrors is the code of our times. It is rooted in the lack of understanding: how can we explain the behavior of political elites, not only those of the far-right, but the so-called centrists?  In the last two years, Meloni’s communication and actions were based on obfuscation: requests for clarifications from Israel when UNIFIL members were attacked or when Cardinal Pierbattista Pizzaballa, the Latin patriarch of Jerusalem, was denied from entering the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem to celebrate the Palm Sunday Mass, unconvincing statements about weapons’ bans and mild condemnations, all while basically conducting business as usual. This posture translates the government’s foreign policy approach, acquiring legitimacy and presenting itself as a strategic mediator, while reassuring both international actors and domestic public opinion alike.  Still, domestically, the government shows its radical face: violent repression of protests, evictions and harsh procedures against public employees showing solidarity. The case of Francesca Albanese, the UN special rapporteur on the occupied Palestinian territories, and an Italian citizen, left completely alone to face US sanctions and treated as a controversial figure, is another sign. The parliament is currently also discussing a law against antisemitism, adopting the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s controversial definition, thus making unlawful protests and criticism against Israel, including the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions campaigns, following in the footsteps of France.  The rest of Europe is also silent. They had to wait for the war on Iran to become “complicated” and to directly affect their economies, before expressing some shy criticism. At the beginning, the aggression against Iran, if not applauded, was endorsed with tacit agreement by most of the European leaders. We are again reminded of the infamous statements of German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, when he said that “this is the dirty work that Israel is doing for all of us,” in the context of the 12-day war on Iran last June.  This has not gone without a price. The distance between political elites and public opinions in Europe is both formidable and unprecedented. A recent poll in Germany showed that 84 percent are dissatisfied with the government. In the United Kingdom, the Labour Party lost 200,000 members in the last five years and much consensus under Prime Minister Keir Starmer. In France, the shadow of Marine Le Pen, the far-right politician of Assemblée Nationale (National Rally) haunts President Emmanuel Macron. The list goes on, and still, nothing changes. The European far-right march is quite aligned: Islamophobia, hate of immigrants and entrenched defense of an imagined Christian European identity against the loose category of the other.  The alignment is also based on some fascination with Israel, its supremacist character, in general, and its ethno- and techno-security-oriented practices, in particular. The far-right in Israel today is the only far-right in the world that can really implement its fascist vision without almost any restraint. It shows a dream that, for now, cannot be fulfilled at home. For Le Pen, Meloni and their allies, looking at Israel’s actions must be like turning the pages of Philip Dick’s novel The Man in the High Castle: reading an alternative history in which they did not lose the war. In a declining West, this vision has a certain power on a domestic level: promising security, identifying an easy scapegoat (immigrants) and defending an identity in crisis. For far-right populists, the genocide in Gaza and the escalation with Iran and Lebanon extended the borders of that vision. The end-of-time face of fascism, a fascism that invests and believes the world is condemned to conflict and environmental apocalypse, where only the strongest ones will survive (perhaps by moving to Mars), is repugnant to most people. Beyond the national borders of a reassuring populism that promises security and the continuation of local traditions, everyone starts to recognize death, destruction, oppression and accelerated decline.  But there is something to Italian mobilizations, alongside others in Europe, that can provide a lesson and an opportunity. The lesson is that international solidarity under certain conditions can mobilize more people than local struggles for wages, welfare and pensions. The government tried to use this against the protestors, accusing the strikers of caring more for Palestinians than Italian workers.  These arguments, however, now that oil prices have risen because of the war on Iran, can act as a boomerang. The fascist and colonialist powers responsible for the genocide in Gaza are beginning to directly affect the lives of people in Europe and the US. The repression of Palestine solidarity movements was already affecting freedom of expression in those countries. The militarization and the return of military conscription, even if it is more related to the war in Ukraine, are read as ominous signs of the same problem.  These developments reinforce the conviction that fighting for the rights of Palestinians means fighting for everyone’s rights. This is where they have to be stopped, before it is too late.  Here lies the opportunity: the end-of-time fascism is real, and its catastrophic acts will endanger the entire globe and life as we know it. In this context, Italy shows that international solidarity can be used to reveal the tensions and the contradictions that the current order is exacerbating and serve as a platform to transform them into larger dissent.  Italy in the 20th century had, arguably, been a laboratory to observe political phenomena that would later extend globally, inventing fascism under Benito Mussolini at the turn of the century and creating precursors like Donald Trump in the US and Javier Milei in Argentina, with Silvio Berlusconi.  Maybe such a laboratorial platform is unfolding again, in the 21st century, with the convergence of Italian dissent over domestic qualms with the endangering loss of any trust in a rule-based order, through Italy’s unconditional endorsement of Israel and Trump. Meloni’s support for both has not only contributed to tarnish her political reputation in Italy, but it served as a point of aggregation so that other issues could be piled up, ultimately putting her coalition under considerable pressure, with the possibility they could lose the next elections, due next year.  Whether this will happen is not yet clear, but something is changing. The post How the horrible month of March for Meloni might change the path of Italy first appeared on Mada Masr.