The "Day of Remembrance" in which they are commemorated is a warning against dictatorships of all colors and latitudes.

Dearest Mrs. Segre,
when I was in school, that is, in the 50s and 60s, the historians of the post-war regime shamefully forgot about the foibe so dear to comrade Tito, where it seems certain that no one came back as happened to you, fortunately and I am pleased, from a concentration camp. So I ask you what you do on February 10, the Day of Remembrance. If Hitler and Mussolini were certainly dictators, what can you tell me about Stalin, his purges and his re-education centers affectionately called Gulag?
Enzo Bernasconi

This letter from Mr. Bernasconi speaks of tragic events that deserve the utmost respect, but I confess that it made me smile bitterly: the way he asks his questions in fact implies the belief that I may have some sympathy, or at least indulgence, towards the communist dictators Tito and Stalin. A curious belief that has no foundation in the conduct of my entire life, since I have always been hostile to all dictatorial regimes of any color and at any latitude. I don't even think it's necessary to spend many words on the bloodthirsty tyrant Stalin. He was one of the greatest criminals in history and, except for a few nostalgics, the judgment has long been established.
It is perhaps more useful to dwell on the foibe. In 2008 I was invited to Trieste to receive an honorary degree. On that occasion, with the precious guidance of my friend Fabio Coen, who unfortunately is no longer with us, I visited the Basovizza foibe, a national monument since 1992. In this case, it is an artificial cavity, a mining shaft in a hamlet of Trieste, in the north-eastern area of ​​the Carso plateau. History would have handed it down to us as one of the terrible places where executions took place.
of Italians from Venezia Giulia, Quarnaro and Dalmatia by Yugoslavian communist partisans, in two waves of violence: first after September 8, 1943 and then in the spring of 1945. I was deeply affected by that place of horror and by the historical explanations I received. Reflecting on that tragedy, one cannot help but feel infinite sorrow for the fate that truly raged against our Julian-Dalmatian compatriots. First the foibe, the terror and the persecutions by Tito's followers. Then the forced exodus from the lands of our ancestors. Then the hostility and removal by the Italian communists, given that Tito's regime was communist. Then the reticence of the government parties, because Tito had broken with Stalin, becoming a darling of the West. And again, the advocacy of the cause of the exiles by that right nostalgic for fascism which, since the latter was responsible for the war, should have been the first to ask their forgiveness. Finally, to come to more recent times, the institution of the Day of Remembrance in 2004 was entirely understandable. But it was not, alas, free from political exploitation, starting with the choice of the date, February 10, the anniversary of the peace treaty signed in 1947 in Paris between Italy and the Allied powers, as if that tragedy had been caused by peace rather than war. In reality, that date, so close to the Day of Remembrance on January 27, dedicated to the victims of the Shoah, seems to lend itself to the intentions of those who, armed with a bad conscience, are waiting for nothing else than to say: "And so the foibe?".
The Italians of Venezia Giulia, Istria and Dalmatia – victims too mistreated and mistreated by too many – deserve full solidarity and an authentic memory.

Liliana Segre

Source: Today – 22/11/2022