FARINACCI, ROBERTO°

FARINACCI, ROBERTO ° (1892–1945), leading antisemite in the Italian Fascist regime. A socialist until 1914, Farinacci became one of the founders of the Fascist movement in March 1919. He served as a member of the Gran Consiglio del Fascismo, as a member of parliament, and, between 1925 and 1926, as Fascist Party secretary. Farinacci represented the fanatic and extremist element in the Fascist leadership. In 1921 he founded a daily newspaper, Cremona Nuova, later renamed Il Regime Fascista, which he edited until 1945. In this newspaper he advocated a strong line against the opponents of the regime, closer relations with Nazi Germany, and the adoption of a racist, antisemitic policy. From 1938 he was one of those who directed the Fascist government's racist policy. His antisemitic book, La Chiesa e gli Ebrei, was published in 1938. He also wrote Storia della rivoluzione fascista (3 vols., 1940). In July 1943 he fled to Germany, but later returned to Italy, where he was executed by Italian partisans in April 1945.

bibliography:

R. de Felice, Storia degli ebrei italiani sotto il fascismo (1961); Roth, Italy, 522, 525; Milano, Italia, 691; P. Pellicano, Ecco il diavolo, Israele! (1938); Starr, in: jsos, 1 (1939), 105–24. add. bibliography: H. Fornari, Mussolini's Gadfly: Roberto Farinacci (1971); U.A. Grimaldi, Farinacci, il piu fascista (1972); R.A. Rozzi, I cremonesi e Farinacci (1991).

[Daniel Carpi]