Fascist sympathizers take to street as Falange founder's body exhumed

Story by By REUTERS • 

Three people were arrested on Monday after police clashed with sympathizers of Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera, founder of Spain's fascist Falange movement that supported the Francoist regime, whose body was exhumed from a mausoleum near Madrid

Supporter of the founder of Spanish fascist Falange party, Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera, gesture outside the San Isidro cemetery, where his remains exhumed from the Franco-era monument known as "The Valley of the Fallen" were transferred, in Madrid, Spain, April 24, 2023© (photo credit: Juan Medina/Reuters)

Spain on Monday dug up the body of Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera, founder of the fascist Falange movement that supported the Francoist regime, and removed it from a mausoleum carved into a mountainside near Madrid as sympathizers gave fascist salutes.

A handful of supporters gathered outside the gates of the complex formerly known as the Valley of the Fallen made the gesture and held up banners saying "Jose Antonio is present" or shouted "Long live Spain" as his hearse drove past.

Police struggled to hold back a larger crowd of about 150 Falange supporters gathered outside the San Isidro cemetery in southern Madrid, where he was to be reburied. They gave the fascist salute and sang the Falangist hymn "Facing the sun."

His exhumation, which follows the 2019 removal of the remains of dictator Francisco Franco, is part of a plan to convert the complex built by Franco, which last year was renamed the Valley of Cuelgamuros, into a memorial to the 500,000 people killed during Spain's 1936-39 civil war.

Presidency Minister Felix Bolanos on Friday hailed the exhumation as another step in giving the valley new symbolism.



Supporters of the founder of Spanish fascist Falange party, Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera, wait to pay tribute outside the San Isidro cemetery, where his remains exhumed from the Franco-era monument known as ''The Valley of the Fallen'' were transferred, in Madrid, Spain, April 24, 2023. (credit: Juan Medina/Reuters)© Provided by The Jerusalem PostSupporters of the founder of Spanish fascist Falange party, Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera, wait to pay tribute outside the San Isidro cemetery, where his remains exhumed from the Franco-era monument known as ''The Valley of the Fallen'' were transferred, in Madrid, Spain, April 24, 2023. (credit: Juan Medina/Reuters)

"No person or ideology that evokes the dictatorship should be honored or extolled there," he said at the time.

The son of dictator Miguel Primo de Rivera, who governed Spain from 1923-1930, Jose Antonio was shot by firing squad in November 1936 by left-wing Republican forces in Alicante.

Exhuming the leader's body

It is the fifth time his body has been buried and the fourth time it has been exhumed.

In 1939, after having lain in two different mass graves in Alicante, his coffin was paraded 500 km (300 miles) from the eastern coastal city to San Lorenzo de El Escorial, a town near Madrid where Spain's royals are buried.

His remains were moved again on the completion of the Valley of the Fallen monument 20 years later and buried under the altar of the basilica, where Franco would join him on his death in 1975.

Franco, a conservative general, and Primo de Rivera, a flamboyant playboy, had little love for each other, according to Franco's biographer Paul Preston.

Franco sabotaged several efforts to organize a rescue or a prisoner swap that would have saved Primo de Rivera's life, Preston wrote in his biography.

His death allowed Franco to eliminate a rival and take control of the Falangists, subsuming them to a broader far-right movement that supported his dictatorship.

The government is carrying out works in the mausoleum to permit access to the crypts where 34,000 people's remains, many of them victims of Franco's regime, are buried anonymously, allowing families to identify their relatives.

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for FALANGE 

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for PHALANGE 

LA REVUE GAUCHE - Left Comment: Search results for SPANISH CIVIL WAR 

Trump denies briefing on reported bounties against US troops
By LYNN BERRY and ZEKE MILLER

President Donald Trump pumps his fist as he walks on the South Lawn after arriving on Marine One at the White House, Thursday, June 25, 2020, in Washington. Trump is returning from Wisconsin. (AP Photo/Alex Brandon)
THE FASCIST FIST OF FRANCO AND THE FALANGE

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Sunday denied that he had been briefed on reported U.S. intelligence that a Russian military intelligence unit secretly offered bounties to Taliban-linked militants for killing American troops in Afghanistan, and he appeared to minimize the allegations against Moscow.

American intelligence officials concluded months ago that Russian officials offered rewards for successful attacks on American service-members last year, at a time when the U.S. and Taliban were holding talks to end the long-running war, according to The New York Times.

Trump, in a Sunday morning tweet, said “Nobody briefed or told me” or Vice President Mike Pence or chief of staff Mark Meadows about “the so-called attacks on our troops in Afghanistan by Russians.”

“Everybody is denying it & there have not been many attacks on us,” he said.

The White House had issued a statement Saturday denying that Trump or Pence had been briefed on such intelligence. “This does not speak to the merit of the alleged intelligence but to the inaccuracy of the New York Times story erroneously suggesting that President Trump was briefed on this matter,” press secretary Kayleigh McEnany said.

Trump’s director of national intelligence, John Ratcliffe, also said neither the president nor vice president was “ever briefed on any intelligence alleged” in the Times’ report and he said the White House statement was “accurate.”

Trump’s tweet came a day after presumptive Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden said that the report, if accurate, was a “truly shocking revelation” about the commander in chief and his failure to protect U.S. troops in Afghanistan and stand up to Russia.

Russia called the report “nonsense.”

“This unsophisticated plant clearly illustrates the low intellectual abilities of the propagandists of American intelligence, who instead of inventing something more plausible have to make up this nonsense,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said.

A Taliban spokesman said the militants “strongly reject this allegation” and are not “indebted to the beneficence of any intelligence organ or foreign country.”

John Bolton, a former national security adviser who was forced out by Trump last September and has now written a tell-all book about his time at the White House, said Sunday that “it it is pretty remarkable the president’s going out of his way to say he hasn’t heard anything about it, one asks, why would he do something like that?”

Bolton told NBC’s “Meet the Press” that he thinks the answer “may be precisely because active Russian aggression like that against the American service members is a very, very serious matter and nothing’s been done about it, if it’s true, for these past four or five months, so it may look like he was negligent. But of course, he can disown everything if nobody ever told him about it.”

The Times, citing unnamed officials familiar with the intelligence, said the findings were presented to Trump and discussed by his National Security Council in late March. Officials developed potential responses, starting with a diplomatic complaint to Russia, but the White House has yet to authorize any step, the report said.

Trump responded to Biden on Twitter, saying “Russia ate his and Obama’s lunch during their time in office”

But it was the Obama administration, along with international allies, that suspended Russia from the Group of Eight after its unilateral annexation of Crimea from Ukraine — a move that drew widespread condemnation.

Biden criticized Trump for “his embarrassing campaign of deference and debasing himself” before Russian leader Vladimir Putin. Trump tweeted that “Nobody’s been tougher” on Russia than his administration.

Trump denies being told about Russian bounties to kill U.S. troops in Afghanistan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Donald Trump on Sunday said he was never briefed about Russian efforts to pay bounties to Taliban-linked militants to kill U.S. troops in Afghanistan, blasting a New York Times report that he had been told about the rewards but had not acted to respond to Moscow.

The White House on Saturday also denied that Trump was briefed on U.S. intelligence regarding the affair but it did not address the merits of the intelligence. The Director of National Intelligence also said Trump and Vice President Mike Pence were not briefed, and called the Times report inaccurate.

“Nobody briefed or told me, @VP Pence, or Chief of Staff @MarkMeadows about the so-called attacks on our troops in Afghanistan by Russians, as reported through an ‘anonymous source’ by the Fake News @nytimes. Everybody is denying it & there have not been many attacks on us,” Trump tweeted, calling on the newspaper to reveal its source.

The Times on Friday reported that U.S. intelligence had concluded that a Russian military intelligence unit linked to assassination attempts in Europe had offered rewards for successful attacks last year on American and coalition soldiers, and that Islamist militants or those associated with them were believed to have collected some bounty money.

Russia’s foreign ministry dismissed the report.

Democrats said the report and Trump’s denial were the latest evidence of the president’s wish to ignore allegations against Russia and accommodate President Vladimir Putin.

“There is something very wrong here. But this must have an answer,” U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi told ABC’s “This Week” program.

“You would think, the minute the president heard of it, he would want to know more, instead of denying that he knew anything,” she said, adding that Trump has already given “gifts” to Putin by diminishing U.S. leadership in NATO, reducing U.S. forces in Germany and inviting Russia back into the G8.

Reporting by Susan Heavey and David Morgan; Editing by Alistair Bell

Macron seeks 'new step' towards Algerian Harki fighters

DESPITE THE CRCODILE TEARS THESE WERE REACTIONARY FASCISTS BETRAYED BY THEIR MASTER

NOT UNLIKE THEIR CHRISTIAN COUNTERPARTS 

IN LEBANON AND SPAIN; THE FALANGE

Issued on: 20/09/2021 - 

Hundreds of thousands of Algerian Muslims -- known as Harkis -- served as auxiliaries in the French army during the war for Algerian independence Jean-Marie HURON AFP/File


Paris (AFP)

French President Emmanuel Macron on Monday meets with Algerians who fought for France in their country's war of independence in a fresh attempt to come to grips with a dark chapter in French colonial history.

Hundreds of thousands of Algerian Muslims -- known as Harkis -- served as auxiliaries in the French army in the war that pitted Algerian independence fighters against their French colonial masters from 1954 to 1962.

At the end of the war -- waged on both sides with extreme brutality including widespread torture -- the French government left the Harkis to fend for themselves, despite earlier promises that it would look after them.


Trapped in Algeria, many were massacred as the country's new masters took brutal revenge.

Thousand others were placed in camps in France, often with their families, in degrading and traumatising conditions.

Successive French presidents had already begun owning up to the betrayal of the Algerian Muslim fighters.

Successive French presidents had already begun owning up to the betrayal of the Algerian Muslim fighters Jacques GREVIN INTERCONTINENTALE/AFP/File

Macron's predecessor Francois Hollande in 2016 accepted "the responsibilities of French governments in the abandonment of the Harkis".

But Macron's meeting Monday with 300 people, mostly surviving Harkis and their families, is to mark "a new step" towards a full recognition of France's responsibility for their suffering, his office said.

- 'Task of reparation' -

The meeting comes only days before national Harki day, which has been observed since 2003 -- especially in southern France where many of the surviving fighters settled after the war.

Their political sympathies often lie with the nationalist right whose leader, Marine Le Pen, is the frontrunner among Macron's rivals in France's presidential election next spring.

In a speech Monday, Macron will "start the task of reparation," his office said.

After the war thousands of Harkis were placed in camps in France, often with their families, in degrading and traumatising conditions - AFP/File

"The president believes that the work accomplished over the past 60 years is important but that a new step is necessary in terms of recognising the failures towards the Harkis, but also the failure of the French republic to live up to its own standards," Macron's office said.

The history of the Harkis could not be separated from the history of France, it said.

Authorities have in the past allowed a number of legal procedures to go ahead for the Harkis and their families to claim damages from France.

- 'Hypocrisy' -

But Harki organisations want an official recognition of their treatment to be enshrined in a law by the end of the year, they said in an open letter to Macron.

"We hope that you will be the one to end 60 years of a certain hypocrisy by which the abandoning of the Harkis is recognised in speeches, but not in the law," they said.

The associations also want approved payouts to be increased.

Macron's initiative comes over a year after he tasked historian Benjamin Stora with assessing how France has dealt with its colonial legacy in Algeria.

The report, submitted in January, made a series of recommendations including owning up to the murder of a prominent Algerian independence figure and creating a "memory and truth commission".

Macron has already spoken out on a number of France's unresolved colonial legacies, including nuclear testing in Polynesia, its role in the Rwandan genocide and war crimes in Algeria.

Before the end of his mandate he is expected to attend ceremonies marking the anniversaries of two key events still weighing on French-Algerian relations: the brutal repression of a demonstration of Algerians on October 17, 1961, by Paris police who beat protesters to death or drowned them in the river Seine, and the signing of the Evian accords on March 18, 1962, which ended the war of independence.

© 2021 AFP

Extreme rights 2.0: A big global family

Steven Forti
2 May, 2024





First published at NACLA.


The victory of Javier Milei in Argentina’s presidential elections last November exploded a veritable atomic bomb, whose shockwaves reach far beyond the Latin American country. The paleolibertarian economist, known for his crude insults against “lefties,” immediately received congratulations from the members of what the Spanish philosopher and politician Clara Ramas has called the new Reactionary International. Although they have never brandished chainsaws at their rallies, for Donald Trump, Jair Bolsonaro, Viktor Orbán, Giorgia Meloni, José Antonio Kast, and Santiago Abascal, Milei is one of their own.

The arrival of Milei and his La Libertad Avanza party to the Casa Rosada is just the latest example of a process that has been developing over at least three decades and that has accelerated in the wake of the 2008 economic crisis. Currently, in addition to Argentina, the extreme right governs in four European countries (Italy, Hungary, Finland, and the Czech Republic), externally supports a conservative executive in Sweden, and could soon reach the government in the Netherlands, after the success of Geert Wilders in the November elections. As is known, the far right also ruled in Poland for two terms and in Brazil and the United States for one. In 2024, elections could propel far-right formations into governments in Portugal and Austria, not to mention the political earthquake that would come with electoral gains for the far right in the European Parliament elections in June and, above all, in the United States in November, with the possible return of Trump to the White House.

In short, as the Dutch political scientist Cas Mudde has pointed out, these political forces have become demarginalized. That is, on the one hand, they have become relevant political actors and accessed the government in various countries. On the other hand, their ideas have become normalized, shaping political agendas while being shared within conventional spaces. The radicalization of mainstream right-wing parties is reliable proof of this shift, as is the extreme right’s “conquest of the streets,” which has even included violence against political institutions or party headquarters in the United States, Brazil, and Spain.

In this early 21st century, a new spectre haunts the world. It is not the spectre of communism, as Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels explained in the mid-19th century, but the spectre of the extreme right. Although there are still no leading intellectuals nor a manifesto of a worldwide far-right party, this does not mean that it is not a globally organized, albeit heterogeneous, political force. On both sides of the Atlantic, recent events clearly show this is the case.

Fascist, populist, or radical right?

The rise of these political formations has led to a whole series of public and academic debates. The first is related to the definition of this phenomenon. It is often said that fascism has returned. In this regard, the thesis of eternal fascism or Ur-Fascism put forward by the Italian intellectual Umberto Eco has notably circulated in recent years. According to Eco, the creation of a “fascist nebula” requires the presence of only one of the 14 characteristics he detailed in his essay, among which are the cult of tradition, fear of the other, or the appeal to frustrated middle classes. Is this true? The question is not trivial, because the ability to define a political phenomenon is the first essential step to being able to understand and, by extension, combat it.

There is no doubt that these new extreme rights— or, as I will explain later, extreme rights 2.0—are the greatest threat to democratic values and the very survival of pluralist liberal democracies today. That does not mean it is correct to interpret them through the lens of fascism. As the Italian historian Emilio Gentile has pointed out, the thesis of eternal fascism is a consequence of the banalization of fascism. This banalization, on the one hand, has turned the concept into an insult, a synonym for “absolute evil.” On the other, it has led to a kind of ahistoriology “in which the historical past continually adapts to current desires, hopes, and fears.”

In short, what Gentile calls historical fascism was not only an ultranationalist, racist, and xenophobic political movement. Fascism, created in Europe after World War I, also had other core characteristics that we do not find in the extreme right today, such as its militia party organization, totalitarianism as a form of government, imperialism as a project of military expansion, regimenting of the population into large mass organizations, and self-presentation as a revolutionary rebirth and political religion. This does not mean that there are no elements of continuity between those experiences and current ones. However, fascism was a different creature. Today, neofascist and neo-Nazi groups still exist, but they are an ultra-minority.

Along with fascism, there is another obstacle that prevents us from defining and understanding the new extreme rights: populism. The debate on this topic has been endless over the last two decades. A consensus has not yet been reached on what populism is, beyond having become a kind of catch-all into which everything that does not fit within traditional political ideologies can fall. Some consider populism an ideology, albeit a thin one. Others, however, prefer to talk about it as a strategy or a political style. Given the absence of a defining doctrine, I believe that the second interpretation is more accurate. Add to this the fact that we are living in a time when populism permeates everything. If Milei, Gustavo Petro, and even French President Emmanuel Macron are populists, what good is this concept? Rather, this trend is the hallmark of our times, and it would be appropriate to talk, as Marc Lazar and Ilvo Diamanti have proposed, about “peoplecracy.” The extreme right uses the rhetorical and linguistic tools of populism, but populism in and of itself does not help us define and understand it.

That said, what concept should we use to define the political parties or movements led by Trump, Milei, Bolsonaro, Kast, Meloni, Le Pen, Orbán, or Abascal? Some speak of national populism and others opt for post-fascism, neither of which allow us, in the end, to move beyond the conceptual obstacles mentioned above. The term that has perhaps gotten the most traction is radical right. According to Mudde, unlike the extreme right, which rejects the very essence of democracy, the radical right accepts “the essence of democracy but opposes fundamental elements of liberal democracy, most notably minority rights, rule of law, and separation of powers.” In practice, the radical right accepts free, albeit not fair, elections— consider the case of Orbán’s Hungary in the last 12 years—and what ultimately is a simulacrum of democracy as we know it.

However, this proposal is problematic. On the one hand, is it correct to use the same adjective—radical— to define formations of the new extreme right and leftist forces such as Podemos, Syriza, the Broad Front of Chile, or La France Insoumise, as if there were some kind of symmetry? Personally, I think it is a mistake. The radical left criticizes existing liberal systems, focusing above all on the neoliberal model and economic issues, but it does not question the separation of powers, nor the democratic rights and gains guaranteed by these same systems. Rather, the radical left calls for an expansion and deepening of these rights, along with a reduction in inequalities.

On the other hand, as Beatriz Acha Ugarte notes: “Can we conceive of a non-pluralist democracy? Can we describe as democratic—albeit not in its ‘liberal version’—forces that, in their treatment of the ‘other’ (immigrant, foreigner), show their contempt for the democratic principle of equality?” By defending an ideology of exclusion incompatible even with the procedural version of democracy, and by calling into question the very existence of the rule of law, we should be cautious in considering these forces democratic.

Why do people vote for the far right?

The second debate has to do with the causes behind these political forces’ electoral advances. Why do people vote for them? In sum, three major causes have been identified, which are never exclusive, but rather must be considered alongside the peculiarities of each national context. First, the increase in inequalities, as well as the precariousness of work, weakening of the welfare state, and shrinking of the middle class, have pushed some voters who are dissatisfied with neoliberal economic recipes to choose the options on the ballot that criticize the existing order.

The second is what has been called cultural backlash—that is, the cultural reaction to liberal globalization. Our societies have gradually become multicultural, and in recent decades, many demands labeled post-materialist have become rights, from divorce to abortion to marriage equality. This shift has led, according to experts, to a reaction from sectors of the population who see their positions in society and even their identities threatened. They then vote for parties that reject immigration, criticize what they consider progressive excesses, and defend the traditional family.

Third, liberal democracies are experiencing a profound crisis. Our societies have become frayed—they are more liquid and atomized due to the prevailing neoliberal model and technological revolution, political parties no longer serve as an effective conduit between territories and institutions, unions face enormous difficulties in adapting to a fully post-Fordist reality, and citizen distrust continues to increase. In such atomized societies, where trust in institutions seems to have disappeared, it is not unreasonable to imagine that part of the electorate opts for parties that say they want to destroy everything or, at the very least, that oppose the establishment and criticize the functioning of democracies that they consider slow, ineffective, or disconnected from the will of the people.

To these three causes, we could add a fourth that has even more to do with the perceptions of the population. In a world that’s difficult to understand, demand for protection and security has increased. What will happen to my job in 10 years with artificial intelligence? What will happen in our neighborhoods if migrants from other continents keep arriving? What will come of the family model in which many of us have grown up if queer couples are allowed to adopt children or gender fluidity is accepted? What will come of our social relationships in times of virtual reality with projects like the Metaverse? In their own way, the extreme rights 2.0 know they need to offer security and protection to many people who live in fear of what the future may bring, giving simple answers to complex problems.

Understanding the extreme rights 2.0

To recap, there is considerable confusion about what to call these political formations and a series of causes to explain their electoral gains on both sides of the Atlantic. Some of these causes may outweigh others in a specific country, region, or municipality. We must, however, always take them all into account. Is Milei’s victory explained only by the economic crisis and increasing inequalities in Argentina? Without denying the importance of these factors, it would be wrong to relegate to a second or third place the high levels of citizen distrust towards traditional political parties and institutions, as well as the cultural reaction to the so-called “progressive consensus.”

It is often said that the European and Latin American contexts are not comparable. However, I do not believe we should keep the analyses and, consequently, the definitions of these phenomena separate. The fact that there are some differences or national peculiarities among the causes of the far rights’ electoral advances does not invalidate the possibility of conceiving of and using a concept on a global scale. On the contrary, it is useful to forge a macro-category that is elastic enough to include all these political formations. Based on these considerations, I have proposed the perhaps somewhat provocative concept of extreme rights 2.0.

With this concept, in the plural, I seek to highlight not only that the Trumps, Le Pens, Mileis, and Orbáns represent a phenomenon distinct from historical fascism, with radically new elements compared to the past, but also that new technologies have played a crucial role in the rise of these political formations. Likewise, I wish to highlight that, despite some divergences, they share much in common, in terms of both ideological basis and political and communications strategies. Last but not least, all of these figures not only know each other and maintain relationships with some frequency, but they also consider themselves part of the same global family.

Among their common ideological reference points are a marked nationalism, a deep criticism of multilateralism and the liberal order, anti-globalism, defense of conservative values, defense of law and order, criticism of multiculturalism and open societies, anti-progressivism, anti-intellectualism, and a formal distancing from past experiences of fascism, without rejecting so-called dog whistle politics— winks or references to authoritarian regimes of the past. In Europe and the United States, identitarianism, nativism, condemnation of immigration as an “invasion,” xenophobia, and more specifically Islamophobia, certainly play a crucial role. Within Latin America, there is no shortage of cases—consider Chile—where the extreme right also has clearly leveraged rhetoric rejecting immigration, mainly of Venezuelans. That said, those in Latin America who José Antonio Sanahuja and Camilo López Burian have proposed calling the neopatriotic right have most in common with the European far right.

The European extreme rights are not all exactly the same either. Neither were the fascisms of the interwar era, and this does not mean we cannot use a macro-category to talk about the regimes of Hitler, Mussolini, and Franco. Among these divergences today it is worth first mentioning their economic programs. There are forces, like Vox in Spain or Chega in Portugal, that are ultra-liberal, and those, like Le Pen in France, that defend so-called welfare chauvinism, without calling into question the neoliberal model. Second, when it comes to values, positions are much more ultra-conservative in the south and east of Europe compared to the extreme right of the Netherlands or Scandinavia, which are a bit more open on issues such as LGBTQIA+ rights and abortion. Finally, there are geopolitical differences since there are some Russophile parties and other Atlanticist parties.

At the same time, there are commonalities. One is exacerbated tacticism—that is, the ability to quickly change positions on crucial issues, without having any qualms about appearing incoherent, such as on the question of the European Union or measures to confront Covid-19—with the aim of setting the media agenda. Similarly, they share the ability to use new technologies and social media to make their messages go viral, gather citizen data, and further polarize society with culture wars. Another element, as the Argentine historian Pablo Stefanoni explains, is the willingness to present themselves as transgressors and rebels against a system supposedly dominated by a left that has established a progressive or politically correct dictatorship. The new far rights have not only made themselves more “presentable,” they are also trying to appropriate progressive and left-wing banners—think about the use of the concept of freedom or phenomena such as homonationalism or ecofascism—in a historical moment marked by what the French sociologist Philippe Corcuff has called ideological confusionism.

A big global family

To paraphrase the historian Ricardo Chueca, who studied the Spanish Falange during the Franco regime, each country gives life to the extreme right 2.0 that it needs. We can add that each extreme right is the offspring of the political cultures present in each national context. Thus, their peculiarities do not prevent them from being considered part of a large global family since, in addition, there are transnational networks that work to strengthen existing ties, develop a common agenda, and finance these political parties.

On the one hand, all these political leaders share personal relationships. They know each other, talk often, congratulate each other on social media, and meet and participate in gatherings organized by the other parties. In the European Union, the existence of the political groups Identity and Democracy (ID) and European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), which bring together the continent’s far-right parties, offers space for the right to share ideas and experiences. It is true that the extreme right has not managed, neither in the past nor the present, to unify into a single group in the European Parliament, nor into a single community-wide party. But the parties both in the ID and in the ECR share a considerable understanding of the landscape and can reach compromises, as has been demonstrated by the manifesto in defense of a Christian Europe that the majority of these parties signed in July 2021.

On the other hand, global networks woven by foundations and conservative think tanks are gaining importance. One of these is the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), linked to the U.S. Republican Party, which has tentacles in Australia, Japan, Brazil, Mexico, and Hungary. Likewise, there is the Atlas Network, a promoter of free-market ideas based in DC, and the Edmund Burke Foundation, a conservative research institute founded in the Netherlands in 2019 and linked to ultra-conservative Israeli, U.S., and European sectors. One of its key figures is the Israeli philosopher Yoram Hazony, author of the 2018 book The Virtue of Nationalism and president of the Herzl Institute, a main animator of what is presented as “national conservatism.”

At the same time, many of these parties have created political training schools whose teachers often include members of the extreme right from other countries. Marion Maréchal Le Pen, niece of Marine Le Pen, created in France the Higher Institute of Sociology, Economics, and Politics, which, together with Vox, also opened a headquarters in Madrid. Among the many pro-government organizations created by Orbán in Hungary, it is worth mentioning the Mathias Corvinus Collegium, which currently has more than 20 locations in Hungary, Romania, and Brussels, and around 7,000 students. Among its guest speakers last year was former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. The director of the Collegium’s Center for European Studies is Rodrigo Ballester of Spain, who is linked to Vox and its think tank, the Disenso Foundation. Meanwhile, in Poland, the far-right Law and Justice party has promoted its university, the Collegium Intermarium, which is linked to the ultra-Catholic think tank Ordo Iuris. In addition, the ECR organizes courses for “future leaders” throughout Europe through its foundation, New Direction.

Connections are increasingly transatlantic. These connections are not only thanks to CPAC or the activism of Orbán’s Hungary, which organizes forums such as the Budapest Demographic Summit, but also because of the role that Vox, headed by Santiago Abascal, is playing in relation to Latin America. Through the Disenso Foundation, the party has developed the notion of Iberosphere, which promotes ties between right-wing parties on both sides of the Atlantic, in the Iberian Peninsula and Latin America. In 2020, Vox launched the Madrid Charter, a programmatic manifesto that made the Iberosphere concept official and enabled the creation of the Madrid Forum. This organization, which presents itself as a counterweight to the São Paulo Forum and the Puebla Group, has organized several meetings in the region, including in Bogotá in 2022 and Lima in 2023, in addition to the Iberosphere summits. In this way, Vox has strengthened relations with the Latin American far right, from Brazil to Chile, passing through Argentina, Peru, Colombia, and Mexico, offering meeting spaces to share a common agenda. One of the main links has been Vox European Parliament member Hermann Tertsch, third vice chair of the Euro-Latin American Parliamentary Assembly (EuroLat), which shows once again the importance of the networks being woven from Brussels.

To all this activity we must add the networks created in Christian fundamentalist orbits, which have been very active since at least the late 1990s. One of the best-known examples is the World Congress of Families, an organization founded between the United States and Russia in 1997 that now has branches throughout the globe. Among its participants is HazteOír, an organization founded in 2001 by Spanish lawyer Ignacio Arsuaga, who went on in 2013 to launch the international lobby group CitizenGo. Likewise, the Political Network for Values, headed by José Antonio Kast, has been organizing transatlantic meetings for a decade. Among its leading members is Jaime Mayor Oreja, former minister in the Spanish government under the Popular Party’s José María Aznar and founder of the “cultural platform” One of Us, a Catholic think tank that defends the prohibition of abortion, euthanasia, gay marriage, and “gender ideology.” This brief overview offers just a small sample of a very well-organized and dense network.

Electoral autocracies

Taking all this into account, it is difficult not to consider these political formations as part of the same political family. They defend largely the same ideas, promote similar policies, and share the same forums internationally. They also have the same objectives. First, they seek to shift the public debate to the far right—that is, to move the Overton window, making acceptable rhetoric and narratives that up until a few years ago were unacceptable. Second, they seek to radicalize the traditional right either by conquering them from within or by forcing them to become allies. Third, they seek to come to power to establish an illiberal democracy following the Orbán model. Today’s Hungary is not a full democracy, but a “hybrid regime of electoral autocracy,” as the European Parliament defined it in September 2022.

And Hungary is a model. It is no coincidence that Orbán traveled to Buenos Aires on December 10 for Milei’s inauguration and met with the new Argentine president. Likewise, far-right European, U.S., and Latin American politicians have often traveled to Budapest to learn how to hollow out democracy from within. When they fail to do so, they call the elections fraudulent and promote violent actions against institutions, as we saw in Washington in January 2021 and, two years later, in Brasília. The extreme rights 2.0 are not historical fascism, but they are, without a doubt, the greatest existing threat to democratic values.

Just look at the policies approved by Milei after his inauguration. In the first weeks of his administration, he introduced measures aimed at deregulating the economy, along with brutal cuts to social assistance, indiscriminate attacks on civil rights, and the criminalization of unions and protests to the point of eliminating freedom of assembly and demonstration. In this context, it is not unreasonable to draw a parallel between the Decree of Necessity and Urgency signed by Milei to implement his “shock therapy,” and especially his proposed omnibus “Law of bases and starting points for the freedom of Argentines,” and the “Enabling Law” approved by the German parliament in March 1933. In practice, the overturning of Congress that Milei seeks to impose in his omnibus bill would mean the end of the separation of powers and the rule of law itself. In other words, the death of democracy—exactly what happened in Germany with Hitler’s arrival to power.


Steven Forti is a professor of Contemporary History at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. Among other works, he is the author of Extrema derecha 2.0 (2021) and editor of Mitos y cuentos de la extrema derecha (2023). He is a member of the editorial boards of Spagna Contemporanea, CTXT, and Política & Prosa.

Extreme rights 2.0: A big global family

Steven Forti

LINKS
2 May, 2024


First published at NACLA.

The victory of Javier Milei in Argentina’s presidential elections last November exploded a veritable atomic bomb, whose shockwaves reach far beyond the Latin American country. The paleolibertarian economist, known for his crude insults against “lefties,” immediately received congratulations from the members of what the Spanish philosopher and politician Clara Ramas has called the new Reactionary International. Although they have never brandished chainsaws at their rallies, for Donald Trump, Jair Bolsonaro, Viktor Orbán, Giorgia Meloni, José Antonio Kast, and Santiago Abascal, Milei is one of their own.

The arrival of Milei and his La Libertad Avanza party to the Casa Rosada is just the latest example of a process that has been developing over at least three decades and that has accelerated in the wake of the 2008 economic crisis. Currently, in addition to Argentina, the extreme right governs in four European countries (Italy, Hungary, Finland, and the Czech Republic), externally supports a conservative executive in Sweden, and could soon reach the government in the Netherlands, after the success of Geert Wilders in the November elections. As is known, the far right also ruled in Poland for two terms and in Brazil and the United States for one. In 2024, elections could propel far-right formations into governments in Portugal and Austria, not to mention the political earthquake that would come with electoral gains for the far right in the European Parliament elections in June and, above all, in the United States in November, with the possible return of Trump to the White House.

In short, as the Dutch political scientist Cas Mudde has pointed out, these political forces have become demarginalized. That is, on the one hand, they have become relevant political actors and accessed the government in various countries. On the other hand, their ideas have become normalized, shaping political agendas while being shared within conventional spaces. The radicalization of mainstream right-wing parties is reliable proof of this shift, as is the extreme right’s “conquest of the streets,” which has even included violence against political institutions or party headquarters in the United States, Brazil, and Spain.

In this early 21st century, a new spectre haunts the world. It is not the spectre of communism, as Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels explained in the mid-19th century, but the spectre of the extreme right. Although there are still no leading intellectuals nor a manifesto of a worldwide far-right party, this does not mean that it is not a globally organized, albeit heterogeneous, political force. On both sides of the Atlantic, recent events clearly show this is the case.

Fascist, populist, or radical right?

The rise of these political formations has led to a whole series of public and academic debates. The first is related to the definition of this phenomenon. It is often said that fascism has returned. In this regard, the thesis of eternal fascism or Ur-Fascism put forward by the Italian intellectual Umberto Eco has notably circulated in recent years. According to Eco, the creation of a “fascist nebula” requires the presence of only one of the 14 characteristics he detailed in his essay, among which are the cult of tradition, fear of the other, or the appeal to frustrated middle classes. Is this true? The question is not trivial, because the ability to define a political phenomenon is the first essential step to being able to understand and, by extension, combat it.

There is no doubt that these new extreme rights— or, as I will explain later, extreme rights 2.0—are the greatest threat to democratic values and the very survival of pluralist liberal democracies today. That does not mean it is correct to interpret them through the lens of fascism. As the Italian historian Emilio Gentile has pointed out, the thesis of eternal fascism is a consequence of the banalization of fascism. This banalization, on the one hand, has turned the concept into an insult, a synonym for “absolute evil.” On the other, it has led to a kind of ahistoriology “in which the historical past continually adapts to current desires, hopes, and fears.”

In short, what Gentile calls historical fascism was not only an ultranationalist, racist, and xenophobic political movement. Fascism, created in Europe after World War I, also had other core characteristics that we do not find in the extreme right today, such as its militia party organization, totalitarianism as a form of government, imperialism as a project of military expansion, regimenting of the population into large mass organizations, and self-presentation as a revolutionary rebirth and political religion. This does not mean that there are no elements of continuity between those experiences and current ones. However, fascism was a different creature. Today, neofascist and neo-Nazi groups still exist, but they are an ultra-minority.

Along with fascism, there is another obstacle that prevents us from defining and understanding the new extreme rights: populism. The debate on this topic has been endless over the last two decades. A consensus has not yet been reached on what populism is, beyond having become a kind of catch-all into which everything that does not fit within traditional political ideologies can fall. Some consider populism an ideology, albeit a thin one. Others, however, prefer to talk about it as a strategy or a political style. Given the absence of a defining doctrine, I believe that the second interpretation is more accurate. Add to this the fact that we are living in a time when populism permeates everything. If Milei, Gustavo Petro, and even French President Emmanuel Macron are populists, what good is this concept? Rather, this trend is the hallmark of our times, and it would be appropriate to talk, as Marc Lazar and Ilvo Diamanti have proposed, about “peoplecracy.” The extreme right uses the rhetorical and linguistic tools of populism, but populism in and of itself does not help us define and understand it.

That said, what concept should we use to define the political parties or movements led by Trump, Milei, Bolsonaro, Kast, Meloni, Le Pen, Orbán, or Abascal? Some speak of national populism and others opt for post-fascism, neither of which allow us, in the end, to move beyond the conceptual obstacles mentioned above. The term that has perhaps gotten the most traction is radical right. According to Mudde, unlike the extreme right, which rejects the very essence of democracy, the radical right accepts “the essence of democracy but opposes fundamental elements of liberal democracy, most notably minority rights, rule of law, and separation of powers.” In practice, the radical right accepts free, albeit not fair, elections— consider the case of Orbán’s Hungary in the last 12 years—and what ultimately is a simulacrum of democracy as we know it.

However, this proposal is problematic. On the one hand, is it correct to use the same adjective—radical— to define formations of the new extreme right and leftist forces such as Podemos, Syriza, the Broad Front of Chile, or La France Insoumise, as if there were some kind of symmetry? Personally, I think it is a mistake. The radical left criticizes existing liberal systems, focusing above all on the neoliberal model and economic issues, but it does not question the separation of powers, nor the democratic rights and gains guaranteed by these same systems. Rather, the radical left calls for an expansion and deepening of these rights, along with a reduction in inequalities.

On the other hand, as Beatriz Acha Ugarte notes: “Can we conceive of a non-pluralist democracy? Can we describe as democratic—albeit not in its ‘liberal version’—forces that, in their treatment of the ‘other’ (immigrant, foreigner), show their contempt for the democratic principle of equality?” By defending an ideology of exclusion incompatible even with the procedural version of democracy, and by calling into question the very existence of the rule of law, we should be cautious in considering these forces democratic.

Why do people vote for the far right?

The second debate has to do with the causes behind these political forces’ electoral advances. Why do people vote for them? In sum, three major causes have been identified, which are never exclusive, but rather must be considered alongside the peculiarities of each national context. First, the increase in inequalities, as well as the precariousness of work, weakening of the welfare state, and shrinking of the middle class, have pushed some voters who are dissatisfied with neoliberal economic recipes to choose the options on the ballot that criticize the existing order.

The second is what has been called cultural backlash—that is, the cultural reaction to liberal globalization. Our societies have gradually become multicultural, and in recent decades, many demands labeled post-materialist have become rights, from divorce to abortion to marriage equality. This shift has led, according to experts, to a reaction from sectors of the population who see their positions in society and even their identities threatened. They then vote for parties that reject immigration, criticize what they consider progressive excesses, and defend the traditional family.

Third, liberal democracies are experiencing a profound crisis. Our societies have become frayed—they are more liquid and atomized due to the prevailing neoliberal model and technological revolution, political parties no longer serve as an effective conduit between territories and institutions, unions face enormous difficulties in adapting to a fully post-Fordist reality, and citizen distrust continues to increase. In such atomized societies, where trust in institutions seems to have disappeared, it is not unreasonable to imagine that part of the electorate opts for parties that say they want to destroy everything or, at the very least, that oppose the establishment and criticize the functioning of democracies that they consider slow, ineffective, or disconnected from the will of the people.

To these three causes, we could add a fourth that has even more to do with the perceptions of the population. In a world that’s difficult to understand, demand for protection and security has increased. What will happen to my job in 10 years with artificial intelligence? What will happen in our neighborhoods if migrants from other continents keep arriving? What will come of the family model in which many of us have grown up if queer couples are allowed to adopt children or gender fluidity is accepted? What will come of our social relationships in times of virtual reality with projects like the Metaverse? In their own way, the extreme rights 2.0 know they need to offer security and protection to many people who live in fear of what the future may bring, giving simple answers to complex problems.

Understanding the extreme rights 2.0

To recap, there is considerable confusion about what to call these political formations and a series of causes to explain their electoral gains on both sides of the Atlantic. Some of these causes may outweigh others in a specific country, region, or municipality. We must, however, always take them all into account. Is Milei’s victory explained only by the economic crisis and increasing inequalities in Argentina? Without denying the importance of these factors, it would be wrong to relegate to a second or third place the high levels of citizen distrust towards traditional political parties and institutions, as well as the cultural reaction to the so-called “progressive consensus.”

It is often said that the European and Latin American contexts are not comparable. However, I do not believe we should keep the analyses and, consequently, the definitions of these phenomena separate. The fact that there are some differences or national peculiarities among the causes of the far rights’ electoral advances does not invalidate the possibility of conceiving of and using a concept on a global scale. On the contrary, it is useful to forge a macro-category that is elastic enough to include all these political formations. Based on these considerations, I have proposed the perhaps somewhat provocative concept of extreme rights 2.0.

With this concept, in the plural, I seek to highlight not only that the Trumps, Le Pens, Mileis, and Orbáns represent a phenomenon distinct from historical fascism, with radically new elements compared to the past, but also that new technologies have played a crucial role in the rise of these political formations. Likewise, I wish to highlight that, despite some divergences, they share much in common, in terms of both ideological basis and political and communications strategies. Last but not least, all of these figures not only know each other and maintain relationships with some frequency, but they also consider themselves part of the same global family.

Among their common ideological reference points are a marked nationalism, a deep criticism of multilateralism and the liberal order, anti-globalism, defense of conservative values, defense of law and order, criticism of multiculturalism and open societies, anti-progressivism, anti-intellectualism, and a formal distancing from past experiences of fascism, without rejecting so-called dog whistle politics— winks or references to authoritarian regimes of the past. In Europe and the United States, identitarianism, nativism, condemnation of immigration as an “invasion,” xenophobia, and more specifically Islamophobia, certainly play a crucial role. Within Latin America, there is no shortage of cases—consider Chile—where the extreme right also has clearly leveraged rhetoric rejecting immigration, mainly of Venezuelans. That said, those in Latin America who José Antonio Sanahuja and Camilo López Burian have proposed calling the neopatriotic right have most in common with the European far right.

The European extreme rights are not all exactly the same either. Neither were the fascisms of the interwar era, and this does not mean we cannot use a macro-category to talk about the regimes of Hitler, Mussolini, and Franco. Among these divergences today it is worth first mentioning their economic programs. There are forces, like Vox in Spain or Chega in Portugal, that are ultra-liberal, and those, like Le Pen in France, that defend so-called welfare chauvinism, without calling into question the neoliberal model. Second, when it comes to values, positions are much more ultra-conservative in the south and east of Europe compared to the extreme right of the Netherlands or Scandinavia, which are a bit more open on issues such as LGBTQIA+ rights and abortion. Finally, there are geopolitical differences since there are some Russophile parties and other Atlanticist parties.

At the same time, there are commonalities. One is exacerbated tacticism—that is, the ability to quickly change positions on crucial issues, without having any qualms about appearing incoherent, such as on the question of the European Union or measures to confront Covid-19—with the aim of setting the media agenda. Similarly, they share the ability to use new technologies and social media to make their messages go viral, gather citizen data, and further polarize society with culture wars. Another element, as the Argentine historian Pablo Stefanoni explains, is the willingness to present themselves as transgressors and rebels against a system supposedly dominated by a left that has established a progressive or politically correct dictatorship. The new far rights have not only made themselves more “presentable,” they are also trying to appropriate progressive and left-wing banners—think about the use of the concept of freedom or phenomena such as homonationalism or ecofascism—in a historical moment marked by what the French sociologist Philippe Corcuff has called ideological confusionism.

A big global family

To paraphrase the historian Ricardo Chueca, who studied the Spanish Falange during the Franco regime, each country gives life to the extreme right 2.0 that it needs. We can add that each extreme right is the offspring of the political cultures present in each national context. Thus, their peculiarities do not prevent them from being considered part of a large global family since, in addition, there are transnational networks that work to strengthen existing ties, develop a common agenda, and finance these political parties.

On the one hand, all these political leaders share personal relationships. They know each other, talk often, congratulate each other on social media, and meet and participate in gatherings organized by the other parties. In the European Union, the existence of the political groups Identity and Democracy (ID) and European Conservatives and Reformists (ECR), which bring together the continent’s far-right parties, offers space for the right to share ideas and experiences. It is true that the extreme right has not managed, neither in the past nor the present, to unify into a single group in the European Parliament, nor into a single community-wide party. But the parties both in the ID and in the ECR share a considerable understanding of the landscape and can reach compromises, as has been demonstrated by the manifesto in defense of a Christian Europe that the majority of these parties signed in July 2021.

On the other hand, global networks woven by foundations and conservative think tanks are gaining importance. One of these is the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC), linked to the U.S. Republican Party, which has tentacles in Australia, Japan, Brazil, Mexico, and Hungary. Likewise, there is the Atlas Network, a promoter of free-market ideas based in DC, and the Edmund Burke Foundation, a conservative research institute founded in the Netherlands in 2019 and linked to ultra-conservative Israeli, U.S., and European sectors. One of its key figures is the Israeli philosopher Yoram Hazony, author of the 2018 book The Virtue of Nationalism and president of the Herzl Institute, a main animator of what is presented as “national conservatism.”

At the same time, many of these parties have created political training schools whose teachers often include members of the extreme right from other countries. Marion Maréchal Le Pen, niece of Marine Le Pen, created in France the Higher Institute of Sociology, Economics, and Politics, which, together with Vox, also opened a headquarters in Madrid. Among the many pro-government organizations created by Orbán in Hungary, it is worth mentioning the Mathias Corvinus Collegium, which currently has more than 20 locations in Hungary, Romania, and Brussels, and around 7,000 students. Among its guest speakers last year was former Fox News host Tucker Carlson. The director of the Collegium’s Center for European Studies is Rodrigo Ballester of Spain, who is linked to Vox and its think tank, the Disenso Foundation. Meanwhile, in Poland, the far-right Law and Justice party has promoted its university, the Collegium Intermarium, which is linked to the ultra-Catholic think tank Ordo Iuris. In addition, the ECR organizes courses for “future leaders” throughout Europe through its foundation, New Direction.

Connections are increasingly transatlantic. These connections are not only thanks to CPAC or the activism of Orbán’s Hungary, which organizes forums such as the Budapest Demographic Summit, but also because of the role that Vox, headed by Santiago Abascal, is playing in relation to Latin America. Through the Disenso Foundation, the party has developed the notion of Iberosphere, which promotes ties between right-wing parties on both sides of the Atlantic, in the Iberian Peninsula and Latin America. In 2020, Vox launched the Madrid Charter, a programmatic manifesto that made the Iberosphere concept official and enabled the creation of the Madrid Forum. This organization, which presents itself as a counterweight to the São Paulo Forum and the Puebla Group, has organized several meetings in the region, including in Bogotá in 2022 and Lima in 2023, in addition to the Iberosphere summits. In this way, Vox has strengthened relations with the Latin American far right, from Brazil to Chile, passing through Argentina, Peru, Colombia, and Mexico, offering meeting spaces to share a common agenda. One of the main links has been Vox European Parliament member Hermann Tertsch, third vice chair of the Euro-Latin American Parliamentary Assembly (EuroLat), which shows once again the importance of the networks being woven from Brussels.

To all this activity we must add the networks created in Christian fundamentalist orbits, which have been very active since at least the late 1990s. One of the best-known examples is the World Congress of Families, an organization founded between the United States and Russia in 1997 that now has branches throughout the globe. Among its participants is HazteOír, an organization founded in 2001 by Spanish lawyer Ignacio Arsuaga, who went on in 2013 to launch the international lobby group CitizenGo. Likewise, the Political Network for Values, headed by José Antonio Kast, has been organizing transatlantic meetings for a decade. Among its leading members is Jaime Mayor Oreja, former minister in the Spanish government under the Popular Party’s José María Aznar and founder of the “cultural platform” One of Us, a Catholic think tank that defends the prohibition of abortion, euthanasia, gay marriage, and “gender ideology.” This brief overview offers just a small sample of a very well-organized and dense network.

Electoral autocracies

Taking all this into account, it is difficult not to consider these political formations as part of the same political family. They defend largely the same ideas, promote similar policies, and share the same forums internationally. They also have the same objectives. First, they seek to shift the public debate to the far right—that is, to move the Overton window, making acceptable rhetoric and narratives that up until a few years ago were unacceptable. Second, they seek to radicalize the traditional right either by conquering them from within or by forcing them to become allies. Third, they seek to come to power to establish an illiberal democracy following the Orbán model. Today’s Hungary is not a full democracy, but a “hybrid regime of electoral autocracy,” as the European Parliament defined it in September 2022.

And Hungary is a model. It is no coincidence that Orbán traveled to Buenos Aires on December 10 for Milei’s inauguration and met with the new Argentine president. Likewise, far-right European, U.S., and Latin American politicians have often traveled to Budapest to learn how to hollow out democracy from within. When they fail to do so, they call the elections fraudulent and promote violent actions against institutions, as we saw in Washington in January 2021 and, two years later, in Brasília. The extreme rights 2.0 are not historical fascism, but they are, without a doubt, the greatest existing threat to democratic values.

Just look at the policies approved by Milei after his inauguration. In the first weeks of his administration, he introduced measures aimed at deregulating the economy, along with brutal cuts to social assistance, indiscriminate attacks on civil rights, and the criminalization of unions and protests to the point of eliminating freedom of assembly and demonstration. In this context, it is not unreasonable to draw a parallel between the Decree of Necessity and Urgency signed by Milei to implement his “shock therapy,” and especially his proposed omnibus “Law of bases and starting points for the freedom of Argentines,” and the “Enabling Law” approved by the German parliament in March 1933. In practice, the overturning of Congress that Milei seeks to impose in his omnibus bill would mean the end of the separation of powers and the rule of law itself. In other words, the death of democracy—exactly what happened in Germany with Hitler’s arrival to power.


Steven Forti is a professor of Contemporary History at the Autonomous University of Barcelona. Among other works, he is the author of Extrema derecha 2.0 (2021) and editor of Mitos y cuentos de la extrema derecha (2023). He is a member of the editorial boards of Spagna Contemporanea, CTXT, and Política & Prosa.

THE CHRISTIAN FALANGE ARE FASCISTS
Pope: Lebanon must remain a ‘land of tolerance, pluralism’
By NICOLE WINFIELD

July 1, 2021

1 of 7
The Patriarch of the Syriac Orthodox Church, Moran Mor Ignatius Aphrem II, second from left, the head of the Catholicosate of the Great House of Cilicia of the Armenian Apostolic Church, Aram I, third from left, Pope Francis, fourth from left, Cardinal Bechara Boutros al-Rahi, firfth from left, Patriarch of Antioch and All the East for the Syriac Catholic Church, Ignatius Youssef III Younan, right, arrive in St. Peter's Basilica to attend a prayer for Lebanon at the Vatican, Thursday, July 1, 2021. (AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia)

ROME (AP) — Pope Francis insisted Thursday that Lebanon must remain a “land of tolerance and pluralism” as he welcomed the country’s Christian patriarchs to the Vatican to pray for an end to the economic and political crisis that has thrown the country into chaos and threatened its Christian community.

Francis presided over an evening prayer service in St. Peter’s Basilica with the leaders of Lebanon’s Christian churches, which featured prayers and hymns in Arabic, Syriac, Armenian and Chaldean. Members of the Lebanese community in Rome and the diplomatic corps filled the pews.

During the service, Francis insisted that Lebanon’s vocation was to be an “oasis of fraternity where different religions and confessions meet, where different communities live together, putting the common good before their individual interests.”

“Lebanon cannot be left prey to the course of events or (to) those who pursue their own unscrupulous interests,” he said. “It is a small yet great country, but even more, it is a universal message of peace and fraternity arising from the Middle East.”

The Mediterranean nation of 6 million, including an estimated 1 million refugees, has the largest percentage of Christians in the Middle East and is the only Arab country with a Christian head of state. Christians make up a third of the population, and the Vatican fears the country’s collapse is particularly dangerous for the continued presence of its Christian community, a bulwark for the church in the Mideast.

Lebanon is going through an unprecedented economic and financial collapse, coupled with an 11-month political deadlock over the formation of a new government. The developments pose the gravest threat to its stability since the end of its civil war three decades ago. It is also trying to recover from the devastating Beirut port explosion last summer — and the coronavirus pandemic.

Francis invited the religious leaders for a day of prayer that began with a silent meditation at the tomb of the Apostle Peter and was followed by closed-door talks about how to help Lebanon emerge from what the World Bank has described as likely to be one of the worst crises the world has witnessed over the past 150 years.

In his final remarks at the ecumenical prayer service, Francis urged political leaders to find solutions and appealed to the international community to help the country recover.

“Stop using Lebanon and the Middle East for outside interests and profits!” he said. “The Lebanese people must be given the opportunity to be the architects of a better future in their land, without undue interference.”

Embattled Prime Minister-designate Saad Hariri, who met with Francis at the Vatican in April, said from Beirut that he hoped the meeting would call on all Lebanese to preserve their coexistence.

“It is no surprise that the pontiff keeps it in his heart through this invite to 10 spiritual leaders with the aim of getting Lebanon through its difficult reality,” he tweeted Thursday, repeating the words of St. John Paul II that “Lebanon is more than a country, it is a message.”

The Vatican’s foreign minister, Archbishop Paul Gallagher, was blunt in explaining the Holy See’s “strong concern about the collapse of the country” during a briefing with journalists last week.

He said Francis had invited the religious leaders to Rome in an acknowledgment that the Christian community had been particularly hard-hit by the crisis, which has sent the well-educated middle classes fleeing power cuts, fuel shortages, soaring prices and now sporadic acts of violence.

The crisis, Gallagher said, “risks destroying the internal balance and Lebanon’s own reality, putting at risk the Christian presence in the Middle East.”

Noting the potential for Lebanon to fall into conflict, he said the country must be helped economically and to keep the peace, saying it “remains the final vanguard of an Arab democracy that welcomes, recognizes and coexists with a plurality of ethnic and religious communities that in other countries aren’t able to live in peace.”

“It must be helped to maintain this unique identity, to ensure a pluralist, tolerant and diversified Middle East,” he said.

Francis has said he hopes to visit Lebanon once a government is formed. Gallagher said if that happens soon, Francis could make a trip early next year.

___

AP correspondent Zeina Karam contributed from Beirut.

Spain begins exhuming civil war victims from Franco basilica
By AFP
June 12, 2023

The vast hillside mausoleum was built after the civil war by Franco's regime -- in part by the forced labour of 20,000 political prisoners - 

Copyright POOL/AFP Ian Vogler

Diego URDANETA

Experts on Monday began exhuming Spanish civil war victims from a huge basilica near Madrid, where the body of former dictator Francisco Franco once lay.

The move comes as Spain gears up for an early general election on July 23 in which Socialist Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez faces an uphill battle.

The team will seek to exhume the remains of 128 victims of the 1936-39 civil war from the complex at the Valley of Cuelgamuros, formerly known as the Valley of the Fallen, the democratic memory ministry said.

The aim is to “recover those bodies and deliver them to their families to give them a dignified burial,” the ministry said in a statement sent to AFP.

“This is not about politics, it is simply a matter of pure humanity.”

A laboratory has been set up in the basilica carved into a mountainside to allow the archeologists, forensic experts and scientific police to do their work.

The remains of some 33,000 people from both sides of the civil war are buried anonymously at the complex, which is topped by a 150-metre (500-foot) stone cross.

Many of the remains were moved to the site 50 kilometres (30 miles) northwest of Madrid from cemeteries and mass graves across the country without their families being informed.

While the site is ostensibly dedicated to the memory of all those killed on both sides of the war, only two graves at the basilica were ever marked: those of Franco and of Jose Antonio Primo de Rivera, founder of Spain’s fascist Falange party.

The government relocated Franco’s remains to a civilian cemetery in 2019, and did the same with those of Primo de Rivera in April.

– ‘Long overdue’ –

Many relatives of those buried there have long campaigned to be able to lay their loved ones to rest near their families under their own names.

“Finally, and perhaps too long overdue, Spanish democracy is providing an answer to these victims,’ government spokeswoman Isabel Rodriguez told public television.

Honouring those who died or suffered violence or repression during the civil war and the Franco dictatorship that followed has been a top priority for Sanchez, who came to power in 2018.

A so-called democratic memory law which came into effect in October 2022 aims to turn the Valley of Cuelgamuros into a place of memory for the dark years of the dictatorship.

It also promotes the search for victims who are buried in mass graves across Spain and annuls the criminal convictions of opponents of the Franco regime.

But the law has been politically divisive, with right-wing parties saying it needlessly dredges up the past.

– Long Franco dictatorship –

Opposition leader Alberto Nunez Feijoo, head of the right-wing Popular Party (PP), has vowed to repeal the law if he comes to power in next month’s election.

Surveys suggest the PP will win the snap polls but will need the support of far-right party Vox to govern.

A prominent NGO that represents victims of the Franco regime, the Association for the Reparation of Historic Memory, welcomed the exhumations.

But it deplored that families concerned “learned of the exhumation from the press and are not there.”

“The Franco family was able to carry the dictator’s body from the Valley of the Fallen on their shoulders,” it added in a tweet.

Franco ruled Spain with an iron fist since the end of the civil war intil his death in 1975, one of Europe’s longest dictatorships.

His regime was notorious for imprisoning, torturing and killing people who spoke out against his rule.