Articoli della stampa internazionale su Fiamma Nirenstein 17/04/2008
L'elezione di Fiamma Nirenstein alla Camera dei Deputati nelle liste del PDL ha destato un grande interesse presso la stampa americana e israeliana. Il New York Sun e il Jerusalem Post danno importante risalto alla notizia, inquadrandola nel cambiamento di politica estera più volte annunciato da Silvio Berlusconi, che porterà l'Italia e rinforzare la sua amicizia con gli Stati Uniti e con Israele. Qui di seguito gli articoli dei due prestigiosi giornali e i link ai rispettivi siti.
The Honorable Nirenstein EDITORIAL OF THE SUN - April 16, 2008 It's not every day that a contributor to our newspaper gets elected to parliament, but that is what happened this week to Fiamma Nirenstein, who will become a member of the Italian Chamber of Deputies following the landslide victory of Silvio Berlusconi's People of Freedom Party. Ms. Nirenstein has written for our pages and for another New York-based publication, Commentary, from Israel and from the West Bank and Gaza about the struggle for freedom and democracy and security in the Middle East. Now she will have the chance to affect policy in Rome and Europe through more than her writing. In the course of the campaign she endured anti-Semitic vitriol. The Anti-Defamation League rebuked a communist newspaper that ran a cartoon depicting her as "Fiamma Frankenstein" with a Star of David, a campaign button, and a fascist insignia. The voters did not fall for that, though; the communists won not a single seat in either house of the Parliament, for the first time since the end of World War II. When we reached Ms. Nirenstein by telephone yesterday to offer her our congratulations, she was upbeat, not only because of the result in Italy, but of the promise it held for Europe, which, in France, Germany, and now Italy, has installed a series of more pro-American leaders. "It's a little signal, but it is a signal of change," she said of her own election. This is, among other things, a part of the vindication of President Bush, who has been derided for supposedly poisoning our foreign relations only to have one after another pro-American leader accede on the Continent. On top of that, Mr. Berlusconi has said he plans to make his first foreign trip as prime minister to Israel to mark the 60th anniversary of the founding of the Jewish state, and Ms. Nirenstein has offered to accompany him. It would almost certainly be the first time an Italian prime minister visited Israel accompanied by a Hebrew-speaking member of parliament from his own party. Meanwhile, those pessimists who describe Europe as slouching irreparably toward Eurabia ? well, let them meet the Honorable Nirenstein.
Berlusconi win means seat for pro-Israel J'lem-based journalist Jerusalem Post - April 16, 2008
The results of Monday's Italian election - placing media magnate Silvio Berlusconi back in power for a third run as prime minister, this time after two years of Romano Prodi rule - have one unexpected outcome: Jewish journalist, author and global terrorism expert Fiamma Nirenstein will be in the next Parliament. Nirenstein, the long-time Israel correspondent for the liberal daily La Stampa, and more recently for the Berlusconi-owned, right-wing Il Giornale, is famous in Italy for her unapologetic support of Israel and the United States, and for her vocal opposition to Islamic fundamentalism. Indeed, her most recent book, Israele Siamo Noi (Israel Is Us), was a huge best-seller. She also backed the war in Iraq, from where the previous Prodi-led government withdrew Italian troops as soon as it took office. In Israel, Nirenstein is best known for her association with the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs, where she is a fellow, and for being one of the few European journalists whose reportage on the Middle East portrays Israel and the IDF in a positive light. She has spent nearly two decades dividing her time between Rome and Jerusalem, where she lives with her Israeli husband, news photographer Ofer Eshed. That Nirenstein was asked to join Berlusconi's joint list with Gianfranco Fini, and was placed in the No. 4 slot to guarantee her seat, is a statement on the part of the People of Freedom Party, whose victory indicates a swing back to the pro-Western platform that the previous Berlusconi government espoused, before it was replaced by Prodi. "This pro-American, pro-Israel worldview is connected to a strong identification, on the part of at least one major sector of the Italian people, with the same values of freedom and democracy," Nirenstein said in a phone interview from her Rome apartment, where she watched the election results on TV with her family. Nirenstein pointed to the massive wave of illegal immigration into Europe as one possible explanation for the public's having reinstated Berlusconi. "It is a desire to restore the sense of identity which Italians feel has been affected by the influx of other cultures, most notably Muslim," said Nirenstein. Nirenstein's celebrity in Italy - both for her writings and for her now-defunct television show on global politics - made her the target, during the period leading up to the election, of a smear campaign from the ranks of the extreme Left. An anti-Semitic cartoon that appeared in the Communist paper Il Manifesto, which depicts "Fiamma Frankenstein" wearing a star of David on one lapel and the symbol of the fascist regime in Italy on the other, was circulated widely on the Internet. After being condemned by the Anti-Defamation League and other groups, the Italian press association suspended the membership of the cartoonist for three months. "It was a frightening example of how anti-Semitism has not only reemerged, but has crept into the mainstream of European discourse," asserted Nirenstein.
