Dear Sgarbi, the nightmare of terrorism is behind all those checks
Vittorio Sgarbi is an important Italian art critic, former Member of Parliament and at present mayor of Salemi, a wonderful Sicilian town. He is also a sincere friend of Israel. Recently, invited for a Festival in Jerusalem, on his way back to Italy he was kept at length at Ben Gurion Airport by the security, as often happens. Yesterday he wrote an article on "Il Giornale" titled: "Treated like an enemy. I'll never come back to Jerusalem". I replied to this article with an open letter published on "Il Giornale" on the same day. Here it is:
Il Giornale, December 13, 2009
The young people controlling passengers in the airports know that often death has come from unsuspected people
Dear Vittorio,
I know, the people who suffer the most are those who – like you – listen to the reasons of Israel and always try to bring a ray of light in the darkness of prejudice that prevails when talking about the Jewish state. Just like me. I too suffered many times when I was looked up and down, questioned, blocked for hours by young officials who sometimes were deaf and insistent and sometimes even arrogant and aggressive. I often said to myself that they were uneducated, ill trained to identify terrorists, that they had something against me, an innocent and even friendly individual who had to pay for the risk they and their families run every day, for the discriminations they have to endure, from sports activities to European Universities. You should know that sometimes I ended up sitting on the upper floor with all my books and articles, looked up and down, photographed together with some ladies coming from Eastern Europe who tried to enter the country to work in all sorts of fields. Were they right? Well in the end yes, they were, and you know that.
Today terrorists on planes hardly use weapons, think of September 11; it is the intention that creates the terrorist and no one has it written on his or her face. Then profiling may be a total failure: in 1972 it was the Japanese Red Army who claimed 24 lives at the Ben Gurion airport. I learned very well during the years of the Intifada that terrorism can come out from any corner, from any kind word, from any angelface or elegant attire.
Moreover, they do not know your fame, the royal privilege bestowed on you in Italy whenever there is a barrier in your life. They see you as a very elegant gentleman indeed, but impatient and difficult to decipher. A gentleman who does not have friends or family in Israel, who does not have any objective reason to be faithful to that country. Someone who may have stayed in East Jerusalem, who has extensively traveled in the Palestinian areas, those places where it is possible to receive devices, orders, suggestions… is there anything wrong or objectively deplorable in all this? No, there is no objective reason at all. However there is a long track record of objects that seem to be things like a pair of shoes or a Coca Cola or a tape recorder and instead they are a bomb, or a piece of bomb to be given to somebody else.
In Israel, once again, gas masks are being distributed to any father, mother and child, sometimes even to the family dog. Why, is something new happening? No, nothing, it is the usual persecution Israeli people endure; according to some recent news, Hamas has informed to have strengthened its tunnel system and to have Qassam missiles ready to hit also Tel Aviv. The Israelis are in a sandwich: they prepare themselves for an attack from the South and learn that, in the North, the Hezbollah have tens of thousand of missiles approved by the Lebanese government and that, every day, they say they will wage a war and conduct attacks against the Zionist enemy.
Dear Vittorio, the background of your unpleasant incident at the Ben Gurion airport (but tell the truth, is it not one of the most beautiful and well tended airports in the world and also one of the most moving ones when families reunite after many years, hug and kiss the ground?) is the very face of the apocalypse and you, you that can see and understand these things, don’t you spot the black cloud beyond the young man who offended you so much? If Iran is ready to give up all the possible international sympathy in order to prepare a bomb to destroy the State of the Jews, if it spends billions on terrorism to keep it broiling, how much would they pay to put in the bag belonging to a man called Vittorio Sgarbi, whatever his fame, o even belonging to a woman called Fiamma, whoever she is, something tiny and deadly that I am not able to imagine but which certainly does exist.
Israel is a very poor country. And even if it wants to make a good impression with the Ben Gurion airport, those young people work there at night and study during the day or viceversa. Generally, they have spent three years in the army where they have risked their lives. Very often, they have lost their best friend, or a brother, or their girlfriend while traveling on a bus or eating at a restaurant. It is not rethoric, Vittorio, do not stop loving Israel for so little. I saw some of your outbursts, but I know that you can tell what is fake from what is true, the roles played, the actions made to show off or out of poverty of spirit. There is no such thing there. The aim is to save lives.