Ceremony at the Garden of the Righteous in Nizza Monferrato 2026

On February 11, 2026, Councilor Lea Fubini spoke in Nizza Monferrato, bringing greetings from the Jewish community.
The following is her speech:

Good morning everyone,
I speak on behalf of the Jewish Community of Turin, replacing President Dr. Dario Disegni, who was forced by other institutional commitments to withdraw from his presence, which had previously been guaranteed on several occasions.
I bring the Community’s greetings and, even more, its heartfelt thanks for being involved once again in this important ceremony, which celebrates the eighty-first anniversary of the passing of the Righteous Among the Nations, Police Chief Giuseppe Palatucci. Today, his historical and moral figure is once again commemorated, recalling how much of his work and message has already been amply illustrated during the unveiling of the panel and the subsequent planting of the olive tree—a symbol of peace—which perpetuate and honor his memory. What we are dutifully doing today is part of the praiseworthy work of strong cultural and social commitment that the Municipality of Nizza Monferrato, with the significant contribution of the Asti Police Headquarters, carries out through the Garden in which we find ourselves, dedicated to Remembrance and, in this context, to the Righteous Among the Nations, who represent one of its essential elements. The Garden was conceived and is preserved in the spirit of a specific reference to the Holocaust, that is, the extermination of six million members of the Jewish people, carried out by the Nazi regime as the first and essential element in implementing its policy of racial hygiene. Unfortunately, in many occupied countries, this extermination occurred with the willing complicit assistance of local collaborationist fascist regimes, and was often directly permitted by the culpable passivity of those many who refused to see and understand what was happening. This passivity was later redeemed by the glorious pages written by the men and women who instead rebelled, initiating and completing the Resistance, a precious foundation of our more than precious democratic Constitution. The Municipality’s decision to do so is right and commendable, but this reference to the memory of the Shoah challenges and forces everyone to further reflect on the fact that the Hitlerian regime, without failing to target and exterminate its political opponents, destroyed not only millions of Jews but also millions of members of other social groups, grouped together with the Jews in the regime’s racial hygiene policy. It also targeted and horribly targeted Roma and Sinti, the physically and mentally disabled, homosexuals, blacks and mixed-race people, Jehovah’s Witnesses, and asocial people—all those people it believed expressed values ​​different from those of the phantom pure race that, according to Hitler’s madness, was supposed to govern the new world order. We are therefore all obliged to consider that Nacht und nebel, night and fog, was first and foremost for the Jews, but that in the historical event we recall here, this tragic fate befell many other human beings, who, as individuals and as groups, must also be remembered, and for whom there is an equally strong obligation to remember, respect and pass on. If we are all capable of perpetuating the obligation to remember the Holocaust and all the other victims of Nazi-Fascism, we will draw the motivation, the tools, and the strength not only to confront the resurgences of disruptive anti-Semitism present in our world today, but also to dutifully oppose the hatred and evil that, in so many forms and in so many places, but always with perverse effects, are unfortunately reborn every day, infecting the lives of peoples and overwhelming human lives.