(April 14th, 2016) The book “Broken Games. Slavic children in Italian concentration camps” (EBK-Edizioni Leucotea) by the Lucanian scholar Michele Strazza was recently acquired by the Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, the most important American institution of documentation about the Holocaust. The text, published in 2015, brings back to light a forgotten and painful page of our history: the internment of Slavic children in Italian concentration camps following the occupation of Slovenia. Rab and Monat in the former Yugoslavia, Gonars and Monigo in Italy, were just some of the places where the authorities of the Italian military tolerated and permitted the extermination of innocent children, along with women and elderlies, by hunger and diseases. For the issues addressed and the accuracy of the research, the books is particularly appreciated by the US academics and is present in the libraries of the most prestigious American universities and in the one of the Congress in Washington. After the war the new Italian generation were taught the idea that during the Fascist regimes Italians were somehow different from the Nazis. However things were far from how depicted. The Italian army massacred civilians, deported old men, women and children, created concentration camps where many died because of starvation, diseases, and malnutrition. Among the Italian war crimes it is particularly unpleasant the internment of women and children following the occupation of Slovenia. It is a duty to remember the young victims of this silent and hidden massacre, especially for those who see the historical research not only as the meticulous study of documents but also as a civil service for humanity. (Red)
