NO ONE HATES JUST MEXICANS:

On the very same day that Italians were going to the polls to give Meloni a thumping victory, the Vatican was celebrating the church's "World Day of Migrants and Refugees". The Holy Father and the new Prime Minister would have a very awkward Bible study session. Where Meloni calls for a full naval blockade of Africa to stop migrants coming to Europe, Jesus says, in St Matthew's Gospel: "Come unto me all ye that are weary and burdened and I will give you rest."

Pope Francis explained it thus: "Migrants are to be welcomed, accompanied, promoted and integrated." This is the Pope whose first official trip outside of Rome, back in July 2013, was to the island of Lampedusa, the southernmost point of Italy, where he met refugees and prayed with them. A few months later, off Lampedusa's coast, a small boat carrying 500 people seeking sanctuary in Europe caught fire; 311 of them died. Local people came to the help of those who survived. A carpenter named Francesco Tuccio decided to make small crosses out of the boat's splintered wreckage and give them to the survivors. These Lampedusa Crosses have come to symbolise a very different sort of Christianity from that being espoused by Meloni. She says she "doesn't understand" the Pope. [...]

And then there's Meloni's twisted idea of nation. Even the Labour Party is singing "God save the King" these days, with only the magic grandpa grumbling away that this is "excessively nationalist". Not that he would think that the NHS is "excessively nationalist", nor an extensive programme of nationalisation. The concept of nation and its extensions is not the preserve of retired army colonels longing to bring back the days of flogging and national service. But when Meloni mentions the nation, it is hard not to notice its darker undertones. She talks of the threat of "ethnic substitution", and of the need to defend our "genetic code".

Here is where things turn nasty. For while the nation is a good thing and, I believe, the epitome of democratic legitimacy, ethic nationalism is the very essence of fascism. And Meloni knows this: she comes from the birthplace of fascism. Her party grew out of Mussolini's. And while a party's past cannot be allowed to determine its present -- the Democrats were the most enthusiastic supporters of slavery -- such a past should make a political party all the more scrupulous about what it says, especially when discussing race. And especially Jews.

When Meloni repeatedly denounces George Soros as the enemy, and speaks of her resistance to becoming a "perfect slave at the mercy of financial speculators", she is not just attacking capitalism, she is subtly eliding financial oppression and Jews. The idea of financial speculators praying upon good Christian men and women is one of the oldest antisemitic themes in the book.

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