An Italian Town's White (No Foreigners) Christmas

Time ^ | Tuesday, Dec. 01, 2009 | Jeff Israely

[B-Chan]

Italy's influential Northern League Party has stood out over the past decade for its particular knack in finding new (and not-so-new) ways of offending people based on country of origin and color of skin. In 2003, Umberto Bossi, founder of the party, which once espoused separatism, told an interviewer that police should open fire on the boatloads of undocumented Africans arriving on Italian shores, calling the would-be immigrants "bingo-bongos." Other Northern League pols have proposed everything from separate trains for immigrants to banning the building of new mosques and even prohibiting the serving of kebabs and other non-Italian food in city centers.

The latest swipe by the Northern League attempts some kind of holiday spirit. The league-led city council in Coccaglio, a small town east of Milan, has launched a two-month sweep — from Oct. 25 to Dec. 25 — to ferret out foreigners without proper residency permits. It has been dubbed Natale Bianco, or "White Christmas."

Claudio Abiendi, a longtime Lega Nord member who leads security policy on the city council, told the daily La Repubblica that he came up with the initiative as a way "to start cleaning things up" in Coccaglio, a town of 7,000 with some 1,500 immigrant residents. "For me, Christmas isn't the celebration of hospitality, but rather of Christian tradition and our identity," he said. Abiendi also told the paper that approximately half of the 150 inspections already carried out turned up people who no longer had a right to reside in Italy. He said he would report them to national authorities. (It's not just Italy. See a story about Switzerland debating Swiss identity.) The city council office is responding to requests for interviews with a press release denying any racist intent...

[B-Chan]

I love the way the reporter tries to spin our Lord's words in order to promote unlimited immigration.

[Frantzie]

Illegals bye bye. The Italains have had a long history of having had to battle against intolerant and barbaric Islam for survival. See Battle of Lepanto in 1571 AD as one example.

[New Yawk Minute]

We should be doing that.

[Radl]

I think they do it in Mexico.

[New Yawk Minute]

And they should. Whats the sense of having laws if you dont enforce them?

[paudio]

to ferret out foreigners without proper residency permits.

So, it seems that they're only clean up the illegals.

[MinorityRepublican]

[Zhang Fei]

Now that is a different kind of Christmas spirit.

It's rich for a guy with a name like Jeff Israely to talk about Christmas spirit.

[American Constitutionalist]

How about when liberals spin the Lord's words “ judge you not, lest you shall be judged “

[American Constitutionalist]

If I am not mistaken, in the Old Testament, the Jews were forbidden to marry any foreigners, and if any foreigners who did want to be with the Jews had to adopt the Jewish religion ( remember Rehab ? )

When Jesus was talking about " I was a stranger, and you took me in, ... you have to read the whole text to get it's proper context... he also said, for I was hungry, and you gave me food to eat, I was in prison, and you came to see me in prison, I was naked, and you put cloths on my back ... yeah, after you read and study the whole text, it gives you a whole different meaning, doesn't it ?
When Jesus said, I was a stranger and you let me in, was in a general sense...

[Cronos]

one needs to read between the lines — the problems are the Mozzies, not the Catholic Poles, or Orthodox Moldavians etc. who come to Italy.

[Altura Ct.]

Jeff Israely supports and solicits destruction of peoples and nations.