A passage from Anne Frank’s diary was read on Wednesday before Italian Serie A matches as part of a number of initiatives to condemn the acts of anti-Semitism earlier this week by SS Lazio fans and to keep alive memories of the Holocaust.
A minute of silence was also observed before each of the Serie A matches kicked off, while Lazio players walked out wearing white T-shirts printed with a photograph of Anne Frank and the words “no to anti-Semitism” before their match at Bologna.
They also warmed up in the same T-shirts.
Both Lazio and Bologna fans listened to the passage in silence and applauded at the end of the reading. There were about 500 traveling supporters present, although a group of Lazio hardcore fans boycotted the match.
However, the night was not without incident at Bologna’s Stadio Renato Dall’Ara and other stadiums.
Before entering the stadium, about 100 Lazio fans reportedly uttered fascist slogans while raising their arms in the fascist salute.
In Turin, the reading of the passage was marred by some Juventus ultras singing the Italian national anthem and turning their backs to the pitch, while a section of AS Roma fans chanted for their team during the reading at the Stadio Olimpico in Rome.
On Sunday, Lazio fans had littered the Stadio Olimpico with images of Frank — the young diarist who died in the Holocaust — wearing a jersey of city rivals AS Roma.
The diary passage read: “I see the world being slowly transformed into a wilderness, I hear the approaching thunder that, one day, will destroy us too, I feel the suffering of millions. And yet, when I look up at the sky, I somehow feel that everything will change for the better, that this cruelty too shall end, that peace and tranquility will return once more.”
The Italian Football Federation has said the passage is to be read aloud at all soccer matches in Italy this week.
It said it would also be combined with one minute’s silence before Serie A, B and C matches, plus amateur and youth games this weekend.
Copies of Anne Frank’s diary, signed by the players, were also given to the mascots at the matches.
The Israeli Minister of Culture and Sport Miri Regev has asked her Italian counterpart Luca Lotti to crackdown on racism in soccer.
Regev’s office said a letter dispatched to Lotti called the display “despicable” and accused thousands of Lazio fans of openly identifying with neo-Nazi symbols.
She wrote that calling Roma players “Jews” inferred they were a “scourge to be avoided.”
The Anne Frank House issued a statement on Tuesday.
“We are shocked by these anti-Jewish expressions which are extremely painful to those who have experienced the consequences of the persecution of the Jews,” it said.
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