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    Italy’s Hard-Right Leader Vexes Europe by Playing Nice, Mostly

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    Some still fear an authoritarian turn, but Giorgia Meloni has surprised many by showing a pragmatic streak since coming to power. Now Europe is not sure what to do.ROME — In the weeks before Italy elected the hard-right leader Giorgia Meloni, the left sounded “the alarm for Italian democracy.” The European Union braced for Italy to join ranks with members like Hungary and Poland who have challenged the bloc’s core values. International investors worried about spooked markets.But more than 100 days into her tenure, Ms. Meloni has proved to be less predictable. She has shown flashes of nationalist anger, prompting fears at home and abroad that an authoritarian turn remains just around the corner. But until now, she has also governed in a far less vitriolic and ideological and more practical way.The unexpected ordinariness of her early days has vexed the European establishment and her Italian critics, prompting relief but also raising a quandary as to what extent the toned-down firebrand should be embraced or still cautiously held at arm’s length.Ms. Meloni has made a case for herself. She has calmed international concerns over Italy’s ability to service its debts by passing a measured budget. She has had cordial meetings with European Union leaders and has muted her famously rapid-fire invective against the bloc, migrants and elites. She has followed in the footsteps of her predecessor, Mario Draghi, Mr. Europe himself, seeking to carry through on his blueprint to modernize the country with billions of euros in E.U. pandemic recovery funds.While her coalition partner Silvio Berlusconi went full Putin apologist this weekend — blaming President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine for the Russian invasion of his own country — her popularity has effectively minimized the damage from the loose cannons in her right-wing coalition.In the first electoral test for Ms. Meloni since she her coalition’s victory last September, the center-right crushed the left in regional elections on Monday.“Now we have to deal with reality,” she said on social media in a recent weekly video chat called “Giorgia’s Notes,” explaining why she had to delay a populist electoral promise to give tax breaks on fuel at the pump.Ms. Meloni has been “better than we expected” on economic and financial issues, said Enrico Letta, the center-left leader who had warned she would threaten Italian democracy. He said she had abandoned her clearly stated aggression toward the European Union by deciding “to follow the rules” and by avoiding “making any mistakes.”A gas station in January in Rome. Ms. Meloni has delayed a populist electoral promise to give tax breaks on fuel at the pump.Tiziana Fabi/Agence France-Presse — Getty Images“The reality is she is strong,” said Mr. Letta, who is stepping down from the party leadership after failing to stop Ms. Meloni. “She’s in that full honeymoon, without an alternative within the majority and the opposition divided.”After Ms. Meloni was elected in September, she became the leader of Italy’s most right-wing government since Mussolini. Her party, the Brothers of Italy, was born from the wreckage of Italy’s failed experiment with Fascism. In the opposition, she made common cause with Europe’s other hard-right leaders who have challenged Europe’s democratic values, like Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary.More on ItalyA Fast-Shrinking Nation: Italy’s population of elder Italians is soaring as its birthrate plummets, putting the country at the forefront of a global demographic trend that experts call the “silver tsunami.”Looted Art: Five dozen ancient artifacts that had been illegally looted from archaeological sites have been returned to Italy thanks to a collaboration with authorities in the United States.End of the Road: After 30 years on the lam as one of Italy’s most wanted fugitives, the mobster Matteo Messina Denaro was quietly arrested in Palermo.Truffle Wars: Truffles are big business in Italy. Some are trying to take out the competition by poisoning the dogs that accompany truffle hunters.But since coming to power, if Ms. Meloni has proved to be something less than an Orban in charge of the eurozone’s third largest economy, the difference, analysts say, may be that Italy’s deep dependency on Europe for billions of euros in relief funds and flexibility on its enormous debt has induced moderation.Her seeming willingness to play nice has put Europe’s leaders in the bind of having to decide whether to treat her like the migrant-baiting, verbal bomb thrower of the far right that she had been for decades or the more or less responsible prime minister that she has acted like for months.If she is embraced too closely, it risks legitimizing the hard right and illiberal currents in Europe. If she is rejected, it might seem like she is being punished for doing what was asked of her, creating a dangerous disincentive for the leader of a country large enough to destabilize the entire bloc and global economy.Ms. Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party emerged from the wreckage of Italy’s failed experiment with Fascism. Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesLast week, for example, President Emmanuel Macron of France excluded Ms. Meloni from a dinner in Paris with Mr. Zelensky of Ukraine and Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany, a clear sign that Italy had been knocked down a notch from when Mr. Draghi was in office. But analysts said Mr. Macron also wanted to avoid indirectly legitimizing France’s own right-wing firebrand, Marine Le Pen.Ms. Meloni fumed, saying Italy sought more than “pats on the back,” and some interpreted her huddling in Brussels last week with leaders of the Czech Republic and Poland as a veiled warning. But on Friday, Ms. Meloni, a skillful politician well versed in the politics of victimization, spent a significant amount of time explaining that she did not care about not being invited to Paris.She seemed to try to speak for much of Europe, arguing that she would have counseled against the meeting even if she had been invited because having two, instead of all 27, European leaders in the room risked eroding the bloc’s unity and public support for Ukraine.“It is not easy for any of us to handle the Ukraine issue with public opinion,” she said, adding that the meeting did not help leaders do the “right thing.” European officials have warned that a combative approach only risks diminishing Italy’s influence. And at home, liberals fear that Ms. Meloni is beginning to show her true, authoritarian face.In recent days, her allies have called for the head of a top official at the country’s public television broadcaster after a pop star appeared on Italy’s widely popular Sanremo song contest and ripped up a photograph of a government official in Ms. Meloni’s party. In the photo he was dressed as a Nazi.Critics like Mr. Letta still say there is also plenty to worry about on issues like migration, justice and gay and abortion rights, though he acknowledged that in those areas, “until now, nothing spectacular, nothing dramatic has been done.”“Nothing of what she is doing makes us think that she is taking a fascist turn,” said Giovanni Orsina, the director of the school of government at Luiss Guido Carli University in Rome.Joking that the European establishment reacted to her election as if “someone had died,” Andrea De Bertoldi, a member of Parliament with Ms. Meloni’s Brothers of Italy party, said that her government was “only surprising” to those who did not know her, or who had not followed the normalization of the Italian right in the past 30 years.Ms. Meloni has received only limited one-on-one face time with President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine.Pool photo by Johanna Geron“The fear,” he said, was provoked by political enemies, though he acknowledged that she perhaps sounded a little different during her years venting from the political margins. “To be heard in the opposition,” he said, “you always need to raise the tone.”For now, it seems, she has extinguished fears of burning down Italian democracy with the post-Fascist flame of her party emblem. But the left, searching for traction, has come up with a new critique: that Ms. Meloni might clumsily break the country.“The great problem of the center right in power is different, absolute incompetence,” Stefano Feltri, the editor of the leftist newspaper Domani, wrote in an editorial.One of the first things Ms. Meloni did upon coming to power was crack down on illegal rave parties. The initial draft of the measure targeted “gatherings” of 50 people or more, a law written so broadly as to potentially be used against political or union rallies, and even sporting events. She was forced to redo it. She also had to backtrack on a plan to put a 60 euro basement on credit card purchases, which raised fears of tax evasion.More ideologically, Ms. Meloni has sought to force ships run by nongovernmental organizations to rescue migrants to return to an Italian port after each mission, limiting time at sea. In November, her government tried to block a ship from disembarking migrants in Italy, and instead sought to send it to France, causing tensions with Mr. Macron.The Geo Barents migrant rescue ship docked in January at the port of La Spezia, Italy. Ms. Meloni has sought to force ships run by nongovernmental organizations to return to an Italian port after each rescue mission, limiting time at sea.Luca Zennaro/EPA, via ShutterstockLast week’s exclusion from the Paris dinner inflamed those tensions. Whereas last year, Mr. Draghi, an architect of Europe’s policy on Ukraine, accompanied the French and German leaders on a train to Kyiv, the Ukrainian capital, Ms. Meloni received one-on-one face time with Mr. Zelensky only on the margins of a large meeting in Brussels.“It is so clear that we had two pictures,” Mr. Letta said. “One last year on the train to Kyiv. And yesterday at the Élysée and the picture without Italy.”But Mr. Letta, already bested by Ms. Meloni, was wary of what else she had in store for Europe, including a more ambitious plan to move the continent to the right. He said that she had sought to build new alliances with right-wing forces at the European level to become a power center, with Mr. Orban, ahead of European elections next year.“This is not, of course, a Democratic alarm that I’m launching,” Mr. Letta said. “This is a political alarm.”Gaia Pianigiani More

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      Italia articula su próximo gobierno en torno a un rostro conocido: Silvio Berlusconi

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      El apoyo del magnate de los medios de comunicación definirá la posición de Giorgia Meloni como posible primera ministra del país. La salud de la democracia italiana también está en juego.ROMA — Durante el último mitin de campaña de la coalición de derecha italiana antes de su victoria en las elecciones del mes pasado, el magnate multimillonario Silvio Berlusconi, con una sonrisa congelada en su rostro de cera, estaba en el centro del escenario, apuntalado, literalmente, por sus aliados de la ultraderecha, Giorgia Meloni y Matteo Salvini, que agitaron la mano de Berlusconi por encima de su cabeza.El cuadro pudo haber evocado una versión italiana de Weekend at Bernie’s más que un triunvirato moderno. Pero los tres formarán ahora el gobierno italiano más derechista desde Mussolini. Berlusconi, con 86 años y cada vez menos popularidad, es su frágil eje.Hace casi 30 años, Berlusconi fue quien incorporó a los partidos de sus aliados, antes pequeños y marginales, a uno de sus gobiernos y a la política italiana establecida. Pero ahora es Meloni, líder de los Hermanos de Italia, un partido que desciende de los restos del experimento italiano con el fascismo del siglo pasado, quien casi con seguridad será la próxima primera ministra cuando se forme un gobierno, quizás esta misma semana.La cuestión ahora, sin embargo, es si el envejecido líder de centroderecha puede cumplir su promesa de fungir como una fuerza moderadora y proeuropea en el próximo gobierno de Italia, o si ha perdido el control de la política que puso en marcha y que ha convertido a Italia, la cuna del fascismo, otra vez en un campo de pruebas para el avance de la extrema derecha en Europa. El lunes, Suecia instaló su propio gobierno de derecha, respaldado por un partido de raíces neonazis.“Europa espera mucho de nosotros”, escribió la semana pasada en Twitter Berlusconi, que declinó una solicitud de entrevista. “Y nos consideramos el garante del próximo gobierno”.Incluso antes de que se forme el gobierno, las tensiones ya son evidentes. La semana pasada, cuando Berlusconi ocupaba su nuevo escaño en el Senado, un órgano que hace casi una década lo vetó temporalmente tras una condena por fraude fiscal, los fotógrafos hicieron un acercamiento sobre sus apuntes, quizá colocados a propósito para que fueran visibles, en los que describía a Meloni como “prepotente, arrogante, ofensiva”. Cuando los periodistas le preguntaron al respecto, Meloni espetó que había olvidado algo: “No chantajeable”.Los dos parecieron hacer las paces durante un encuentro el lunes por la noche en Roma; publicaron una foto sonriendo juntos, y Berlusconi los llamó “unidos”.La idea de Berlusconi como protector de la democracia italiana es para muchos algo profundamente preocupante.Simpatizantes del partido de extrema derecha Hermanos de Italia el mes pasado en Cagliari, Cerdeña. Es casi seguro que Meloni, la líder del partido, será la próxima primera ministra cuando se forme un gobierno.Gianni Cipriano para The New York TimesSus numerosos críticos recuerdan los abusos del poder gubernamental para proteger sus intereses empresariales, sus escapadas libertinas con mujeres jóvenes y las llamadas fiestas Bunga Bunga realizadas cuando ocupaba el cargo, su humillación a las mujeres y la cultura italianas con su humor, y sus canales de televisión, a menudo burdos, que, junto con sus periódicos y revistas, aprovechó para realizar propaganda política.Para ellos, es el villano que degradó la democracia italiana, cuyos conflictos de intereses, asociaciones dudosas y aparente ilegalidad desencadenaron un movimiento de oposición de furiosos populistas antisistema y llevaron a la izquierda a una crisis nerviosa de la que aún no se ha recuperado.En la escena internacional, es un viejo amigo del presidente ruso Vladimir Putin, al que defendió el mes pasado, lo que supuso un dolor de cabeza para Meloni, que apoya firmemente a Ucrania en la guerra con Rusia.Berlusconi también provocó un motín entre los centristas de su propio partido en julio, cuando hundió al gobierno del primer ministro Mario Draghi, al que admiraba públicamente, en su afán por volver a probar el poder.“Es muy importante entender inmediatamente que Berlusconi no es amigo de la democracia”, dijo antes de morir Paul Ginsborg, biógrafo de Berlusconi, en una conversación reciente.Pero dada la composición del nuevo gobierno, algunos analistas creen que Berlusconi puede ser el mejor amigo que tienen los defensores de una Italia proeuropea, centrista y democrática.“La parte responsable de la centroderecha la encarna el líder que durante mucho tiempo ha sido considerado el más irresponsable del mundo”, dijo Claudio Cerasa, autor de un nuevo libro, Le catene della destra (Las cadenas de la derecha), sobre la aceptación de las teorías de conspiración por parte de nacionalistas y populistas.“Europa espera mucho de nosotros”, escribió Berlusconi la semana pasada en Twitter. “Y nos consideramos el garante del próximo gobierno”.Gianni Cipriano para The New York TimesCerasa, que también es director de Il Foglio, un periódico fundado por la familia de Berlusconi pero que ahora es independiente, señaló que solo Berlusconi en la derecha italiana había rechazado el trumpismo, el populismo antielitista y el nacionalismo euroescéptico. También sirvió de contrapeso a la desconfianza que Meloni y Salvini expresaron ante las vacunas, y gobernó en coaliciones con la centroizquierda.Muchos en la clase política creen que Berlusconi evitará que Meloni ponga en peligro la unidad europea al gravitar de nuevo hacia sus viejos aliados, entre ellos el primer ministro euroescéptico y de extrema derecha Viktor Orbán de Hungría y Marine Le Pen en Francia. “Él es como una brújula”, dijo Cerasa.No está claro que Meloni lo siga. Este mes, ella participó en un mitin del partido español de extrema derecha Vox, junto con el expresidente Donald Trump y Orbán. “No somos monstruos”, dijo en un mensaje de video. “El pueblo lo entiende”.Meloni, consciente de las preocupaciones que genera su pasado ideológico, desea calmar a los mercados internacionales al nombrar a tecnócratas reconocidos para los ministerios económicos clave. Pero estos siguen rechazándola.Algunos sostienen que el legado más duradero de Berlusconi en la política italiana —más que el debate que forzó sobre los impuestos onerosos o la extralimitación judicial— puede ser su creación de una coalición europea moderna de derecha, formada por partidos antes marginados cuyas versiones actuales lideran Meloni y Salvini.De este modo, Berlusconi eliminó la noción, según John Foot, un historiador del fascismo, de que “un fascista no debería hablar, no debería existir, no debería tener un lugar en la sociedad italiana”.En 2019 Berlusconi dijo durante un mitin político que, en lo que respecta al partido de la Liga de Salvini y a los “fascistas”, “los dejamos entrar en el 94 y los legitimamos”. Insistió, sin embargo, en que “somos el cerebro, el corazón, la columna vertebral”.“Sin nosotros”, dijo, “la centroderecha no existiría ni existirá nunca”.Meloni el mes pasado en Roma. Algunos sostienen que el legado más duradero de Berlusconi en la política italiana puede ser su creación de una moderna coalición de derecha europea.Gianni Cipriano para The New York TimesAlgunos de los antiguos partidarios de Berlusconi consideran que esa alianza fue un golpe maestro democrático, por obligar a la franja a normalizarse y comprometerse con la realidad transaccional de la capital.“Transformó estos dos movimientos que eran, digamos, balas perdidas, o variables fuera de control, y los llevó al puerto constitucional”, dijo Renato Brunetta, que ayudó a fundar el partido Forza Italia de Berlusconi. “Esto fue un elemento estabilizador”.Pero después de que Forza Italia ayudó a desencadenar nuevas elecciones, Brunetta, que fue ministro en el gobierno de Draghi, abandonó el partido y dijo que Meloni era “realmente regresiva en lo que respecta a la cultura de la derecha en Italia”.Meloni, por su parte, agradeció la obra de Berlusconi. En una reciente entrevista, reconoció que “hizo algo inesperado” cuando en 1993 apoyó la candidatura a la alcaldía del entonces líder de su partido Alianza Nacional, que luego fue Ministro de Relaciones Exteriores de Berlusconi.“Eso seguramente hizo que muchos que quizás no tenían el valor de decirlo, y lo creían de corazón, salieran a la luz”, dijo Meloni. “En este sentido, es el tema de la legitimación”.Pero, añadió Meloni, “creo que el momento de la derecha había llegado”.Ahora claramente llegó. El partido de Meloni obtuvo el 26 por ciento de los votos, más que ningún otro. Insistió en que no se limitaba a andar con Berlusconi porque necesitara el pequeño porcentaje de su partido para gobernar, como él necesitó en su día al partido de ella.“No necesitamos llevarlo con nosotros”, dijo Meloni. Y añadió: “Puede que sea la persona que más se ha impuesto en la historia italiana, en la historia republicana italiana, más que cualquier otro en los últimos 20 años”.De hecho, a pesar de su paso cansino y de los jóvenes con banderas que lo protegen de la vista del público al salir del escenario, las cosas parecen ir a favor de Berlusconi.La semana pasada, con el pelo lacado, fue el centro de atención en la sesión de apertura del Senado recién elegido.Berlusconi, en el centro, el jueves en la primera sesión del recién elegido Senado en Roma.Antonio Masiello/Getty ImagesTodas las contradicciones de la historia y la política actual de Italia estaban a la vista. También las tensiones entre los aliados de la derecha.La sesión la abrió un sobreviviente del Holocausto y senador vitalicio que recordó que el fascismo de Mussolini tomó el poder hace 100 años. Los senadores eligieron como presidente a Ignazio La Russa, líder del partido de Meloni, que lleva el segundo nombre de Benito y guarda en su casa recuerdos de Mussolini.Berlusconi, que recibió apretones de manos y peticiones de selfis por parte de los senadores, tiró el bolígrafo y maldijo furiosamente a La Russa, cuya presidencia intentó bloquear como represalia por la negativa de Meloni a nombrar ministra a su propia lugarteniente, Licia Ronzulli, una antigua enfermera que se sienta a su lado y solía ayudar a organizar sus veladas nocturnas con mujeres jóvenes.La novia de Berlusconi, Marta Fascina, de 32 años, obtuvo un escaño en el Parlamento en representación de una ciudad siciliana en la que nunca hizo campaña. El 29 de septiembre, el día del cumpleaños de Berlusconi, hizo que un globo aerostático soltara miles de globos con forma de corazones rojos sobre el jardín de su villa.Al día siguiente, Berlusconi publicó un video de su cena de cumpleaños en el que meseros con guantes blancos sacaban un pastel de varios pisos: uno por su equipo de fútbol, otro por su partido político y otro por su imperio mediático.Encima de todo estaba la imagen de un Berlusconi mucho más joven y con su traje característico, sonriendo junto a una tierra comestible.Jason Horowitz es el jefe del buró en Roma; cubre Italia, Grecia y otros sitios del sur de Europa. Cubrió la campaña presidencial de 2016 en Estados Unidos, el gobierno de Obama y al congreso con un énfasis en perfiles políticos y especiales. @jasondhorowitz More

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      Italy’s Next Government Hinges on a Familiar Face: Silvio Berlusconi

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      Giorgia Meloni’s likely turn as prime minister will depend on support from the billionaire media mogul. So may the health of Italian democracy.ROME — During the final campaign rally for Italy’s right-wing coalition before it emerged victorious in Italy’s elections last month, the billionaire mogul Silvio Berlusconi, a smile frozen on his waxen face, stood center stage, propped up, quite literally, by his hard-right partners, Giorgia Meloni and Matteo Salvini, who waved Mr. Berlusconi’s hand above his head.The tableau may have evoked an Italian remake of “Weekend at Bernie’s” more than a modern-day triumvirate. But the three will now make up the most right-wing Italian government since Mussolini, with Mr. Berlusconi, 86 and decreasingly popular, as its fragile linchpin.It was nearly 30 years ago that Mr. Berlusconi brought his partners’ once small, marginalized parties into one of his governments and Italy’s political mainstream. But today it is Ms. Meloni, the leader of the Brothers of Italy, a party descended from the wreckage of Italy’s experiment with Fascism last century, who is almost certain to be the next prime minister when a government is formed, perhaps as soon as this week.The question now, though, is whether the aging center-right leader can fulfill his promise to act as a moderating, pro-European force on Italy’s next government, or whether he has lost control of the politics he set in motion that have made Italy, the birthplace of Fascism, once again a testing ground for the far right’s advance in Europe. On Monday, Sweden installed its own right-wing government, backed by a party with neo-Nazi roots.“Europe expects much from us,” Mr. Berlusconi, who declined a request for an interview, wrote last week on Twitter. “And we consider ourselves the guarantor of the next government.”Even before the government begins, the tensions are already evident. Last week, as Mr. Berlusconi took his new seat in the Senate, a body that almost a decade ago temporarily barred him after a conviction for tax fraud, photographers zoomed in on his notes, perhaps purposefully left visible, describing Ms. Meloni as “overbearing, arrogant, offensive.” Asked about it by reporters, Ms. Meloni snapped that he forgot something: “Not blackmailable.”The two seemed to make peace during a meeting on Monday evening in Rome; they released a photo of themselves smiling together, and Mr. Berlusconi called them “united.”The notion of Mr. Berlusconi as a protector of Italian democracy is for many a deeply troubling one.Supporters of the hard-right Brothers of Italy party last month in Cagliari, Sardinia. Ms. Meloni, the party leader, is almost certain to be the next prime minister when a government is formed.Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesHis legions of critics recall his abuses of government power to protect his business interests, his libertine escapades with young women and so-called Bunga Bunga parties while in office, his degrading of Italian women and culture with his humor, and his often crude television channels, which, along with his newspapers and magazines, he exploited for political propaganda.For them, he is the villain who debased Italian democracy, whose conflicts of interest, questionable associations and apparent illegality set off an opposition movement of angry anti-establishment populists and drove the left into a nervous breakdown from which it has still not recovered.On the international stage, he is a longtime friend of President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, whom he defended as recently as last month, causing a headache for Ms. Meloni, who is a strong supporter of Ukraine in the war with Russia.Mr. Berlusconi also prompted a mutiny of centrists in his own party in July when he sank the government of Prime Minister Mario Draghi, whom he publicly admired, as he reached for another taste of power.“It’s very important to understand immediately that Berlusconi is no friend to democracy,” Paul Ginsborg, the biographer of Mr. Berlusconi, said in a conversation recently, before his death.But given the composition of the new government, some analysts believe that Mr. Berlusconi may be the best friend proponents of a pro-Europe, centrist and democratic Italy have.“The responsible part of the center-right is embodied by the leader considered for a long time the most irresponsible in the world,” said Claudio Cerasa, the author of a new book, “The Chains of the Right,” about the embrace of conspiracy theories by nationalists and populists.“Europe expects much from us,” Mr. Berlusconi wrote last week on Twitter. “And we consider ourselves the guarantor of the next government.”Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesMr. Cerasa, who is also the editor of Il Foglio, a newspaper founded by Mr. Berlusconi’s family but is now independent, noted that Mr. Berlusconi alone on the Italian right had rejected Trumpism, anti-elite populism and Euroskeptic nationalism. He also served as a counterweight to vaccine skepticism exercised by Ms. Meloni and Mr. Salvini, and he governed in coalitions with the center left.Many in the political establishment believe that Mr. Berlusconi will prevent Ms. Meloni from endangering European unity by gravitating back toward her old allies, including the Euroskeptic and hard-right Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary and Marine Le Pen in France. “He’s like a compass,” Mr. Cerasa said.It is not clear that Ms. Meloni is following him. This month, she, along with former President Donald J. Trump and Mr. Orban, took part in a rally of the far-right Spanish party Vox. “We are not monsters,” she said in a video message. “The people understand that.”Ms. Meloni, aware of concerns about her ideological past, is eager to assuage international markets by appointing mainstream technocrats to key economic ministries. But they keep turning her down.Some argue that Mr. Berlusconi’s most lasting legacy on Italian politics — more than the debate he forced about burdensome taxation or judicial overreach — may be his creation of a modern European right-wing coalition, made from previously untouchable parties, which are now led in their current iterations by Ms. Meloni and Mr. Salvini.In doing so, Mr. Berlusconi eliminated the notion, John Foot, a historian of Fascism, said, that “a Fascist should not speak, should not exist, should not have a place in Italian society.”Mr. Berlusconi said in 2019 at a political rally that, when it came to Mr. Salvini’s League party and the “Fascists,” “we let them in in ’94 and we legitimized them.” He insisted, though, that “we are the brain, the heart, the backbone.”“Without us,” he said, “the center right would never exist and will never exist.”Ms. Meloni last month in Rome. Some argue that Mr. Berlusconi’s most lasting legacy on Italian politics may be his creation of a modern European right-wing coalition.Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesSome of Mr. Berlusconi’s longtime supporters cast that alliance as a democratic masterstroke, for forcing the fringe to normalize and compromise in the transactional reality of the capital.“He transformed these two movements which were, let’s say, loose cannons, or who were out-of-control variables, and brought them into the constitutional harbor,” said Renato Brunetta, who helped found Mr. Berlusconi’s Forza Italia party. “This was an element of stabilization.”But after Forza Italia helped trigger new elections, Mr. Brunetta, who was a minister in Mr. Draghi’s government, quit the party and said Ms. Meloni was “actually regressive when it comes to right-wing culture in Italy.”Ms. Meloni, for her part, appreciated what Mr. Berlusconi had done. In a recent interview, she acknowledged that he “did something unexpected” when in 1993 he supported the mayoral candidacy of the leader at the time of her National Alliance party, who later served as Mr. Berlusconi’s foreign minister.“That surely brought many who maybe did not have the courage to say it, and thought it in their hearts, to come out,” Ms. Meloni said. “In this sense, it is the theme of legitimization.”But, Ms. Meloni added, “I believe the time of the right had arrived.”It now clearly has. Ms. Meloni’s party received 26 percent of the vote, larger than any other. She insisted she was not merely carrying Mr. Berlusconi along because she needed his party’s small percentage to govern, as he once needed her party.“We don’t need to carry him with us,” Ms. Meloni said. She added, “He may be the person who has imposed himself in the Italian history, in the Italian Republican history, more than any other in the last 20 years.”Indeed, despite his shuffling gait and the flag-bearing youths who shield him from view as he exits the stage, things seem to be going Mr. Berlusconi’s way.Last week, his hair looking lacquered, he held court during the first seating of the newly elected Senate.Mr. Berlusconi, center, on Thursday at the first seating of the newly elected Senate in Rome.Antonio Masiello/Getty ImagesAll of the contradictions of Italy’s history and current politics were on display. As were the tensions between the right-wing partners.The session was opened by a Holocaust survivor and senator for life who noted that Mussolini’s Fascism took power 100 years ago. Senators elected as their president Ignazio La Russa, a leader in Ms. Meloni’s party, who carries the middle name Benito and keeps Mussolini memorabilia in his house.Mr. Berlusconi, who received handshakes and selfie requests from senators, threw down his pen and angrily cursed Mr. La Russa, whose presidency he tried to block as a reprisal for Ms. Meloni’s refusal to make a minister out of his own lieutenant, Licia Ronzulli, a former nurse who sat beside him and used to help organize his after-hours soirées with young women.Mr. Berlusconi’s girlfriend, Marta Fascina, 32, won a seat in the Parliament representing a Sicilian town she never campaigned in. On Sept. 29, his birthday, she arranged for a hot-air balloon to release thousands of red balloon hearts over his villa’s garden.The next day, Mr. Berlusconi posted a video of his birthday dinner where waiters in white gloves brought out a multitiered cake — one for his soccer team, one for his political party, one for his media empire.Atop it all sat a likeness of a Mr. Berlusconi, much younger and in his trademark suit, grinning next to an edible earth. More

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      Meloni Faces Early Test of Italy’s Resolve on Russia and Ukraine

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      The hard-right leader Giorgia Meloni has been a full-throated supporter of Ukraine, but her coalition partners have sounded like apologists for Vladimir V. Putin.ROME — Throughout her time in the opposition to Prime Minister Mario Draghi’s national unity government, Giorgia Meloni, the hard-right leader who is poised to become the next Italian prime minister after a strong showing in Sunday’s elections, railed against everything from vaccine requirements to undemocratic power grabs.But on the issue of Ukraine, perhaps the most consequential for the government, she unambiguously criticized Russia’s unwarranted aggression, gave full-throated support for Ukraine’s right to defend itself and, in a recent interview, said she would “totally” continue to provide Italian arms to Kyiv.The same cannot be said for Ms. Meloni’s coalition partners, who have deeply admired Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, and have often sounded like his apologists. Just days before the vote, the former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, once Mr. Putin’s best friend among leaders in Western Europe, claimed “Putin was pushed by the Russian population, by his party and by his ministers to invent this special operation,” and that a flood of arms from the West had thwarted Russian soldiers in their mission to reach “Kyiv within a week, replace Zelensky’s government with decent people and then leave.”The other coalition partner, Matteo Salvini, the leader of the League party, used to wear T-shirts with Mr. Putin’s face on them and has for years been so fawning toward Russia that he has frequently had to reject accusations that he has taken money from Moscow.Recently, with Ms. Meloni apparently uncomfortable as she sat beside him, Mr. Salvini doubted the wisdom of sanctions on Russia, which he said hurt Italy more than Mr. Putin’s government.How Ms. Meloni navigates those tensions in her coalition will now be a key factor in the European Union’s struggle to keep an unbroken front against Russia as the cost of sanctions begins to bite in winter.Prime Minister Mario Draghi of Italy, second from right, visited Ukraine in June with leaders from France, Germany and Romania. Under Mr. Draghi, Italy became a key player in Europe’s hard line against Russia.Viacheslav Ratynskyi/ReutersIf she wavers, especially on sanctions, European leaders who have stood up to Mr. Putin all these months fear it could begin a major unraveling of resolve, widening divisions in the European Union and between the United States and Europe.“We are ready to welcome any political force that can show itself to be more constructive in its relations with Russia,” the Kremlin spokesman, Dmitri Peskov, said after the Italian election results, according to the Russian news service Tass.But analysts said Russia should not expect a change from Ms. Meloni anytime soon, believing that her position on Ukraine is credible and that the weak showing of her partners in the election will allow her to keep them in their place without blowing up their alliance.“I put my hand today on fire that she is not going to bend,” said Nathalie Tocci, the director of the Institute for International Affairs in Rome. “She’s very gung-ho about Russia.”Despite a widespread suspicion that political calculation lay behind Ms. Meloni’s pivot during the campaign to less hostile positions on the European Union and away from leaders such as Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary and Marine Le Pen in France, analysts judged that on the issue of Ukraine, Ms. Meloni was not likely to budge.In the past, Ms. Meloni has admired Mr. Putin’s defense of Christian values, which is consistent with her own traditionalist rhetoric. But unlike other hard-right politicians and newbie nationalists, like Mr. Salvini, Ms. Meloni was raised in a post-Fascist universe in Italy where Russia — and especially Communist internationalists — represented an Eastern force that threatened the sanctity and peculiarities of Western European identities.For Ms. Meloni it was less difficult to step away from the Putin adoration that swept the populist-nationalist right over the last decade. During the campaign, she was happy to point out this difference with her coalition partners, as she was competing with them and it helped differentiate her and reassure the West of her credibility.Pummeling the competition in Sunday’s election will have made it easier to withstand any attempted pressure from Mr. Salvini or Mr. Berlusconi, who both failed to break into double digits in the polls and were thus left with little leverage.In any case, Mr. Berlusconi and Mr. Salvini had already supported the sanctions as part of Mr. Draghi’s national unity government and didn’t bolt over the issue then. Mr. Salvini, who has sought to distance himself from Mr. Putin, was so hobbled by his disastrous performance in the elections that Rome was rife with speculation that he could be replaced as his party’s leader by a more moderate and less ideological governor from the country’s north, where the League has its electoral base.Ms. Meloni meeting with her coalition partners, Matteo Salvini and Silvio Berlusconi, in October 2021. The two men admire Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, and have often sounded like his apologists.Guglielmo Mangiapane/ReutersThat is not to say Ms. Meloni faces no pressure at home for a more forgiving stance. Italy, a country with deep and long ties to Russia, has long had reservations about sanctions against Moscow and getting involved in foreign wars.“I think we should put the question up to the Italians in a referendum,” Stefano Ferretti, 48, a supporter of Ms. Meloni, said on Election Day. “Let’s see if they really want it.”And Italy is not alone in Europe when it comes to doubts about a continued hard line against Russia, and turning away from its cheap energy, ahead of a cold and economically painful winter.In Prague this month, a day after the Czech government survived a no-confidence vote over accusations that it had failed to act on soaring energy prices, tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets to voice outrage on the issue while far-right and fringe groups led many demonstrators in calling for withdrawal from NATO and the European Union. In Sweden, a hard-right party more sympathetic to Mr. Putin was on the winning side in elections this month.Mr. Orban has created complications for the European Union in its efforts to present a united force against Mr. Putin by demanding, and receiving, carve-outs for oil imports in exchange for agreeing to an embargo on Russian crude oil imports, a sanctions measure that required unanimity among member countries. On Monday, Mr. Orban applauded Ms. Meloni’s victory, writing on Facebook: “Bravo Giorgia, A more than deserved victory. Congratulations!”But analysts did not foresee Italy, under Ms. Meloni, playing the same games Hungary has done with sanctions. In her acceptance speech, she emphasized “responsibility” and experts said she was a savvy politician who clearly understood that Italy’s leaving the fold would break the bloc’s Russia strategy.As a reminder, though, only days before the vote, the European Commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, responded to a question about “figures close to Putin” poised to win elections in Italy by saying, “We’ll see.”“If things go in a difficult direction — and I’ve spoken about Hungary and Poland — we have the tools,” she said.Matteo Salvini, the leader of the League party, used to wear T-shirts with Mr. Putin’s face on them.Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesThe tools included the cutting of funds for member states that Brussels considers in violation of the rule of law. Last week, the commission — which is the European Union’s executive arm — proposed to cut €7.5 billion of funds allocated to Hungary.But Italy is a central pillar not only of the European Union, but of its united front against Russia. Aldo Ferrari, head of the Russia, Caucasus and Central Asia Program at the Institute for International Political Studies in Milan, said Ms. Meloni had made her position “amply clear” throughout the election campaign, and that it was through Ukraine that she “sought legitimacy” among international leaders, especially members of the European Union and NATO.And as Russia is an ever less attractive ally, its pull on the West diminishes. The decision by countries of the European Union to endure economic pain together made it less likely that Italy, which is so woven into the fabric of the union, would break.“Our inclusion in the European Union and NATO,” Mr. Ferrari said, overcame the will “of individual politicians and individual countries.”Under Mr. Draghi, Italy became a key player in Europe’s hard line against Russia, which he has framed as an existential issue that will define the contours and values of the continent for decades to come.While some liberals had hoped he would rally to their side during the election campaign, or at least nod that he preferred them, Mr. Draghi stayed out of it completely. Analysts say he saw the polls, and the writing on the wall, and decided the most prudent coarse of action for his platform, legacy and, some critics say, future ambitions, was a smooth transition of power to Ms. Meloni.“I have a good relationship with Draghi,” Ms. Meloni said in an interview earlier this month. She said that more than once, “He could trust in us much more than the parties he had in his majority.”“Look on Ukraine,” she said. “On Ukraine, we made the foreign policy.”Elisabetta Povoledo More

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      Giorgia Meloni Leads Voting in Italy, in Breakthrough for Europe’s Hard Right

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      ROME — Italy appeared to turn a page of European history on Sunday by electing a hard-right coalition led by Giorgia Meloni, whose long record of bashing the European Union, international bankers and migrants has sown concern about the nation’s reliability in the Western alliance. Early projections based on a narrow sampling of precincts, as well as exit polls, on Sunday night suggested that Ms. Meloni, the leader of the nationalist Brothers of Italy, a party descended from the remnants of fascism, had led a right-wing coalition to a majority in Parliament, defeating a fractured left and a resurgent anti-establishment movement. The final results would not be clear until Monday, and it will still be weeks before the new Italian parliament is seated and a new government is formed, leaving plenty of time for political machinations. But Ms. Meloni’s strong showing, with about 25 percent of the vote, the highest of any single party, makes her the prohibitive favorite to become the country’s first female prime minister. While she is a strong supporter of Ukraine, her coalition partners deeply admire Russia’s president, Vladimir V. Putin, and have criticized sanctions against Russia.“From the Italians has arrived a clear indication,” Ms. Meloni, known for her crescendoing rhetoric and cult of personality, said in a measured victory speech at nearly 3 a.m., “for the center-right to guide Italy.”After saying she had suffered through a “violent electoral campaign” filled with unfair attacks, Ms. Meloni spoke about “reciprocal respect” and recreating “trust in the institutions.” She posed flashing a victory sign. “We are at the starting point,” she said, adding, “Italy chose us, and we will never betray it.”The victory, in an election with lower turnout than usual, comes as formerly taboo and marginalized parties with Nazi or fascist heritages are entering the mainstream — and winning elections — across Europe. This month, a hard-right group founded by neo-Nazis and skinheads became the largest party in Sweden’s likely governing coalition. In France this year, the far-right leader Marine Le Pen — for a second consecutive time — reached the final round of presidential elections. In Spain, the hard-right Vox, a party closely aligned with Ms. Meloni, is surging.But it is Italy, the birthplace of fascism and a founding member of the European Union, that has sent the strongest shock wave across the continent after a period of European-centric stability led by Prime Minister Mario Draghi, who directed hundreds of billions of euros in recovery funds to modernize Italy and helped lead Europe’s strong response to Russia. Giorgia Meloni preparing to cast her vote at a polling station in Rome on Sunday.Gianni Cipriano for The New York Times“This is a sad day for the country,” Debora Serracchiani, a leader of the Democratic Party, which will now lead the opposition, said in a statement early Monday morning.Ms. Meloni’s victory showed that the allure of nationalism — of which she is a strong advocate — remained undimmed, despite the breakthroughs by E.U. nations in coming together to pool sovereignty and resources in recent years, first to combat the coronavirus pandemic and then Mr. Putin’s initiation of the largest conflict in Europe since World War II.How, and how deeply, a right-wing coalition in Italy led by Ms. Meloni could threaten that cohesion is now the foremost concern of the European establishment.Ms. Meloni has staunchly, and consistently, supported Ukraine and its right to defend itself against Russian aggression. But her coalition partners — Matteo Salvini, the firebrand leader of the League, and the former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi — have clearly aligned themselves with Mr. Putin, questioning sanctions and echoing his propaganda. That fracture, and the bitter competition between the right-wing leaders, could prove fatal for the coalition, leading to a short-lived government. But some political analysts say Ms. Meloni, having attained power, may be tempted to soften her support for sanctions, which are unpopular in much of Italy. If she does, there is concern that Italy could be the weak link that breaks the European Union’s strong united position against Russia.Ms. Meloni had spent the campaign seeking to reassure an international audience that her support of Ukraine was unwavering. She sought to allay concerns by condemning Mussolini, whom she once admired, and Italy’s Fascist past. She also made more supportive noises about Italy’s place in the European Union and distanced herself from Ms. Le Pen and Prime Minister Viktor Orban of Hungary, whom she had previously emulated. But that pivoting was more for international markets than Italian voters, who didn’t much care about her past, or even her affinity for illiberal democracies. The Italian electorate had not moved to the right, political scientists said, but instead again resorted to a perennial desire for a new leader who could possibly, and providentially, solve all its ills. Ms. Meloni found herself in the right place at the right time. Hers was virtually the only major party to remain outside Mr. Draghi’s national unity government, allowing her to soak up an increasing share of the opposition. Her support surged from 4 percent to nearly about 25 percent.After a revolt by a party in Mr. Draghi’s broad unity government in July, the right-wing parties, eager to go to elections they were favored to win, sensed opportunity and bolted, with Ms. Meloni in the pole position.There is little concern in the Italian establishment that she will undermine Italian democracy — she has been a consistent advocate for elections during unelected technocratic governments and has long served in Parliament. There is also a widespread belief that Italy’s dependence on hundreds of billions of euros in relief funds from the European Union will force Ms. Meloni and her government to follow the spending plans, reforms and overall blueprint established by Mr. Draghi. The money comes in tranches and the plans have to meet strict criteria. If she reverses course, Italy could lose out on billions of essentially free euros as rising energy prices and inflation — much of it stemming from the sanctions against Russia — are expected to worsen in coming months.Giorgia Meloni, addressing supporters during a rally in Piazza Duomo in Milan earlier this month.Piero Cruciatti/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesBut there is concern about Ms. Meloni’s lack of experience and her party’s lack of technical expertise, especially in running the eurozone’s third-largest economy, and Mr. Draghi has kept in close touch with her, both to ensure her support for Ukraine and, insiders say, to help find someone who can provide economic continuity.Nevertheless, Ms. Meloni represents a historic break at the top of Italian government. She came of political age in a post-Fascist, hard right that sought to redefine itself by seizing on new symbols and texts, especially “The Lord of the Rings” and other works by the British writer J.R.R. Tolkien, to distance itself from the taboos of Fascism. She grew up with a single mother in a working-class area of Rome, and being a woman, and mother, has been central to her political identity. She once ran for mayor while pregnant because she said powerful men had told her she couldn’t. Her most famous speech includes the refrain “I am a woman. I am a mother.” Being a woman has also distinguished her, and marked a major shift, from her coalition partners, especially Mr. Berlusconi, the subject of endless sex scandals.But Ms. Meloni, Mr. Berlusconi and Mr. Salvini share a hard-right vision for the country. Ms. Meloni has called for a naval blockade against migrants and spread fears about a “great replacement” of native Italians. The three share populist proposals for deep tax cuts that economists fear would inflate Italy’s already enormous debt, and a traditionalist view of the family that liberals worry will at least freeze in place gay rights and which could, in practice, roll back abortion rights.Despite the constraints of an Italian Constitution that is explicitly anti-Fascist and designed to stymie the rise of another Mussolini, many liberals are now worried that the right-wing coalition will erode the country’s norms. There was concern that if the coalition were to win two-thirds of the seats in Parliament, it would have the ability to change the Constitution to increase government powers. From left to right, Matteo Salvini, Silvio Berlusconi, and Giorgia Meloni attending the final rally of the center-right coalition in Rome on Thursday.Alessandra Tarantino/Associated PressOn Thursday, during one of Ms. Meloni’s final rallies before the election, she exclaimed that “if the Italians give us the numbers to do it, we will.”But the coalition appeared not to hit that mark. The main party of the left, the Democratic Party, all but guaranteed its defeat by failing to heal its differences with other liberal and centrist parties, including a new group of moderates. The moderates, backed by former Prime Minister Matteo Renzi, and attracting some former leaders of Mr. Berlusconi’s party, who were disillusioned with his following of the hard right, did better than expected, but still seemed to remain in the single digits.What really held the right back from a landslide were their former governing partners, the Five Star Movement, the once anti-establishment movement that triggered the collapse of Mr. Draghi’s government when it revolted in July.In 2018, the party’s burn-down-the-elite rhetoric led it to become the country’s most popular party and largest force in Parliament. Years of governing — first with the hard-right Mr. Salvini, and then with the Democratic Party, and then under Mr. Draghi — exposed its incompetence and infighting and it imploded. It seemed on the brink of extinction. But during the campaign, led by former Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, the party surged in the country’s underserved south.That development was mainly because Five Star passed a broad unemployment benefit known as the “citizen’s income,” which though roundly criticized by moderates and the right as a handout to the lazy and a disincentive to work, has become a cherished benefit.As a result, Five Star appeared to be becoming the party of the south.“This is what is emerging,” said Angelo Tofalo, himself a southerner and a leader in the party, as he cheered Mr. Conte, at a rally in Rome on Friday. He said the party had laid down deep roots in the south, but acknowledged, “the citizen’s income is a factor.”That unexpected strength ate into Ms. Meloni’s support, while she devoured the backing of the League party of Mr. Salvini. Only years ago he was the country’s most popular populist. Now he appeared to sink to single digits. Mr. Berlusconi, once the hinge upon which the coalition turned, and who legitimized the marginalized post-Fascists and secessionist League in the 1990s, also registered a modest result.But together they had enough to govern and Ms. Meloni had the clearest claim on the office of prime minister during negotiations and consultations with Italy’s president, Sergio Mattarella, which will take place over the next month. The new government is likely to be seated in late October or early November.But the message of the end of a period of European taboos, and of new change, has already been sent.Ms. Meloni said in one of her last interviews before the election that her victory would be “a redemption” for all the people who “for decades had to keep their heads down” and who had an “alternative vision from the mainstream of the system of power.”Elisabetta Povoledo More

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      What You Need to Know About the Elections in Italy

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      The elections could produce the first government led by a woman and by a hard-right party with post-Fascist roots.ROME — Italians vote on Sunday for the first time in almost five years in national elections that will usher in a new, and polls predict, right-wing government that will face economic challenges, a deepening energy crisis, and questions about Italy’s hard line against Russia and its full-throated support for the European Union.The elections come after the national unity government of Prime Minister Mario Draghi, a darling of the European establishment who is widely credited with increasing Italy’s credibility and influence, collapsed amid a revolt in his coalition.The elections had been scheduled for February, but the premature collapse raised familiar questions about Italy’s stability and the popularity of the country’s far-right opposition, which had grown outside the unity government, and rekindled doubts about Italy’s commitment to the European Union.International markets, wary of the country’s enormous debt, are already jittery. And Italy’s support for sending arms to Ukraine, which has been influential within Europe, has emerged as a campaign issue, raising the prospect of a possible change of course that could alter the balance of power in Europe.Giorgia Meloni, the leader of the hard-right Brothers of Italy party, at a rally this month in Cagliari, Sardinia. Her party has a clear edge in opinion polls. Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesWho is running?Despite the broad popularity of Mr. Draghi, a Eurocentric moderate, it is the populist-infused right, with a recent history of belligerence toward Europe, that has had a clear edge in the polls.Most popular of all has been the hard-right Brothers of Italy party, led by Giorgia Meloni, whose support skyrocketed as it was the only major party to remain in the opposition. If she does as well as expected, she is poised to be Italy’s first female prime minister.Ms. Meloni is aligned with the anti-immigrant and hard-right League party, led by Matteo Salvini, and Forza Italia, the center-right party founded and still led by the former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi.Italy’s election law favors parties that run in a coalition, and so the coalition on the right has an advantage over the fragmented left.The largest party on the left, the Democratic Party, is polling around 22 percent. But Ms. Meloni’s support has polled around 25 percent, and the right is expected to gain many more seats in Parliament, the basis upon which the government is composed.The once anti-establishment Five Star Movement cratered from its strong showing in 2018, when it had more than 30 percent of the vote. But after participating in three different governments spanning the political spectrum, it has lost its identity. Now headed by the former prime minister Giuseppe Conte, it has opted to run alone. In recent weeks, its poll numbers have climbed up, thanks to support in the south, which is rewarding the party for passing, and now defending, a broad unemployment benefit.A centrist party called Azione, led by a former minister, Carlo Calenda, and backed by another former prime minister, Matteo Renzi, would claim a moral victory even if it only hit 6 or 7 percent.At the Brothers of Italy rally in Cagliari. Voters’ main concerns are energy prices, inflation, the cost of living, and Italy’s policy toward Russia and Ukraine.Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesWhat are the issues?While Ms. Meloni’s post-Fascist roots have attracted attention and prompted worries outside of Italy, few voters in Italy seem to care. The issues of the day are energy prices, inflation, the cost of living and Italy’s policy toward Russia and Ukraine.On the last issue, the conservative coalition is split. Ms. Meloni, in part to reassure an international audience that she is a credible and acceptable option, has been a consistent and outspoken supporter of Ukraine throughout the war. Even though she has been in the opposition, where she criticized coronavirus vaccine mandates, she has emerged as a key ally of Mr. Draghi on the question of arming Ukraine.Her coalition partners are less solid on the issue. Mr. Salvini, who has a long history of admiration for President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, even wearing shirts with the Russian’s face on them, has argued that the sanctions against Russia should be reconsidered.Mr. Berlusconi was once Mr. Putin’s best friend among leaders of Western Europe. He once named a bed after Mr. Putin and still argues that he could make peace.The conservative coalition has proposed cutting taxes on essential goods and energy, offering energy vouchers to workers, and renegotiating Italy’s European Union recovery funds to adjust for higher prices. It is also seeking to reinvest in nuclear energy, which Italy has not produced since the 1990s and banned in a 2011 referendum.Its leaders have proposed a deep flat tax and the elimination of unemployment benefits popular in the south — known here as the “citizens’ income.” The benefit, pushed through with much fanfare by the Five Star Movement in its first government, acts as a subsidy to the lowest-income earners.To drum up electoral support, hard-right parties have also tried to make illegal migration an issue, even though numbers are far below earlier years. They are also running to defend traditional parties from what Ms. Meloni has called gay “lobbies.”The right also wants to change the Constitution so that the president can be elected directly by voters — and not by Parliament, as is now the case.The center-left Democratic Party has argued to continue the hard line against Russia and has emphasized energy policies that focus on renewable sources, cutting costs for low and medium-income families, and installing regasification plants to increase natural gas supplies as Italy faces shortages from Russia. The party has advocated easing the path to citizenship for children of immigrants born in Italy, and wants to increase penalties for discrimination against L.G.B.T.Q. people. It also proposes introducing a minimum wage, cutting income taxes to raise net salaries, and paying teachers and health care workers better wages.The Five Star Movement is, like Mr. Salvini, dubious of a hard line against Russia and against the shipment of Italian weapons to help Ukraine. The Five Star Movement is proposing an energy recovery fund to tackle the price surge and investments in renewable energy. It is also calling for a ban on new drilling for fossil fuels.What happens after the vote?Exit polls should come out the night of the vote, but since voting places close at 11 p.m., no official results are expected to be declared until the next day, or even later. But even once the results are known, Italy will not have a new prime minister for weeks.The new members of Parliament will be confirmed and convened in Rome in the middle of October. They will then elect the speaker of the Senate and of the Lower House, and party leaders for each house.The president, Sergio Mattarella, will then begin consultations with the speakers of both houses and the parties’ representatives. The coalition that won the most votes will designate their candidate for premiership. If their candidate is able to win a majority in the newly elected Parliament, the president will appoint a potential prime minister to form a new government.Should Brothers of Italy win the most votes, as is expected, it would be difficult for its coalition parties to justify a prime minister other than Ms. Meloni. More

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      Giorgia Meloni May Lead Italy, and Europe Is Worried

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      The hard-right leader has excoriated the European Union in the past, and she regularly blasts illegal immigrants and George Soros. But she is closer than ever to becoming prime minister.CAGLIARI, Sardinia — Giorgia Meloni, the hard-right leader of a party descended from post-Fascist roots and the favorite to become Italy’s next prime minister after elections this month, is known for her rhetorical crescendos, thundering timbre and ferocious speeches slamming gay-rights lobbies, European bureaucrats and illegal migrants.But she was suddenly soft-spoken when asked on a recent evening if she agreed, all caveats aside, with the historical consensus that the Fascist leader Benito Mussolini — whom she admired in her youth as a “good politician” — had been evil and bad for Italy.“Yeah,” she said, almost inaudibly, between sips of an Aperol Spritz and drags on a thin cigarette during an interview in Sardinia, where she had completed another high-decibel political rally.That simple syllable spoke volumes about Ms. Meloni’s campaign to reassure a global audience as she appears poised to become the first politician with a post-Fascist lineage to run Italy since the end of World War II.Such a feat seemed unimaginable not so long ago, and to pull it off, Ms. Meloni — who would also make history as the first woman to lead Italy — is balancing on a high-stakes wire, persuading her hard-right base of “patriots” that she hasn’t changed, while seeking to convince international skeptics that she’s no extremist, that the past is past, not prologue, and that Italy’s mostly moderate voters trust her, so they should, too.On Sept. 25, Italians will vote in national elections for the first time since 2018. In those years, three governments of wildly different political complexions came and went, the last a broad national unity government led by Mario Draghi, a technocrat who was the personification of pro-European stability.Ms. Meloni led the only major party, the Brothers of Italy, to stay outside that unity government, allowing her to vacuum up the opposition vote. Her support in polls steadily expanded from 4 percent in 2018 to 25 percent in a country where even moderate voters have grown numb to Fascist-Communist name calling, but remain enthusiastic about new, and potentially providential, leaders.As populism swept Italy in the last decade, Ms. Meloni adopted harsher tones and created the hard right’s latest iteration, the Brothers of Italy.Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesMs. Meloni said her skyrocketing popularity did not mean the country had “moved to the extremes,” but that it had simply grown more comfortable with her and confident in her viability, even as she has tried to reposition herself closer to the European mainstream. Ms. Meloni, whose campaign slogan is “Ready,” has become a staunch supporter of NATO and Ukraine, and says she backs the European Union and the euro. The State of the WarDramatic Gains for Ukraine: After Ukraine’s offensive in its northeast drove Russian forces into a chaotic retreat, Ukrainian leaders face critical choices on how far to press the attack.How the Strategy Formed: The plan that allowed Ukraine’s recent gains began to take shape months ago during a series of intense conversations between Ukrainian and U.S. officials.Putin’s Struggles at Home: Russia’s setbacks in Ukraine have left President Vladimir V. Putin’s image weakened, his critics emboldened and his supporters looking for someone else to blame.Southern Counteroffensive: Military operations in the south have been a painstaking battle of river crossings, with pontoon bridges as prime targets for both sides. So far, it is Ukraine that has advanced.Global markets and the European establishment remain wary. “I fear the social and moral agenda of the right wing,” Frans Timmermans, the European Commission’s vice president, said recently about the threat Ms. Meloni’s coalition posed to E.U. values. As recently as last month, she called for a naval blockade against migrants. She has depicted the European Union as an accomplice to “the project of ethnic replacement of Europe’s citizens desired by the great capitals and international speculators.”She has in the past characterized the euro as the “wrong currency” and gushed with support for Viktor Orban of Hungary, Marine Le Pen of France and the illiberal democracies in Eastern Europe. She excoriated “Brussels bureaucrats” and “emissaries” of George Soros, a favorite boogeyman of the nationalist right and conspiracy theorists depicting a world run by Jewish internationalist financiers.There remains concern that, once in power, Ms. Meloni would toss off her pro-European sheep’s wool and reveal her nationalist fangs — reverting to protectionism, caving in to her Putin-adoring coalition partners, rolling back gay rights and eroding liberal E.U. norms.Ms. Meloni called for a naval blockade against migrants as recently as last month.Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesInternational investors and global leaders are wrong to be “afraid,” said Ms. Meloni, who is as affable and easygoing in private as she is vitriolic in public. Even in the midst of a heated campaign, she refused to take the bait from a desperate leader of the divided Italian left, who sounded “the alarm for Italian democracy.”“They’ll accuse me of being a Fascist my whole life,” Ms. Meloni said. “But I don’t care because in any case the Italians don’t believe anymore in this garbage.”She is delivering rations of red meat to her base (mass immigration is “an instrument in the hands of big great powers” to weaken workers, she growled in Cagliari) and is trying to mend fractures with the other right-wing leaders she is running with in a coalition.Her chief ally, Matteo Salvini, became the darling of the hard right in 2018 when he pivoted his once-secessionist northern-based League party into a nationalist force. But Ms. Meloni said those hard-right voters “came back home, because I am of that culture, so no one can do it better than I can.”Even so, Mr. Salvini is already creating problems for Ms. Meloni by urging a reconsideration of sanctions against Russia.Ms. Meloni acknowledged that her other coalition partner, Silvio Berlusconi, the former prime minister who famously named a bed after President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, had put her “in difficulty as a woman” during his Bunga Bunga sex scandals with young women, when she was herself a young woman in his government. Neither of her partners, she suspects, wants a woman in charge.“I would like to say, ‘No, it’s not a problem that I’m a woman,’” Ms. Meloni said. “But I’m no more sure about that.”Ms. Meloni suspects that her coalition partners don’t want a woman in charge.Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesBut when it comes to being a woman in politics, Ms. Meloni has leaned in. Her veneer of Roman-accented authenticity and her escalating and incensed style have become a part of the Italian political, and pop, landscape.In 2019, her hard-line defense of the traditional family, and against L.G.B.T.Q. marriage and adoption — while herself being an unwed mother — prompted D.J.s to mockingly put one of her furious refrains, “I am Giorgia, I am a woman, I am a mother, I am Italian, I am Christian,” to a beat. It went viral. Ms. Meloni used it as a calling card. She titled her best-selling book “I am Giorgia.”Ms. Meloni grew up without her father, who when she was a toddler set sail for the Canary Islands, where she learned Spanish on summer visits. After a fire that she and her older sister accidentally started, her mother, who at one point wrote romance novels to make ends meet, moved the family into the working class and left-leaning Garbatella neighborhood of Rome.Ms. Meloni was overweight and introverted, but as a 15-year-old fan of fantasy books (and Michael Jackson, from whom she said she learned her good English) found what she has called a second family in the hard-right Youth Front of the post-Fascist Italian Social Movement.She considered herself a soldier in Rome’s perpetual, often violent and sometimes fatal ideological wars between Communist and post-Fascist extremists, where everything from soccer games to high schools was politicized. Her party leader went to Israel to renounce the crimes of Fascism at the same time as she was rising quickly, later becoming the republic’s youngest-ever minister.But as populism swept Italy in the last decade, Ms. Meloni adopted harsher tones and created the hard right’s latest iteration, the Brothers of Italy. She said she resented its members’ being depicted as “nostalgic imbeciles,” because she had worked hard to purge Fascists and build a new history.An activist was detained by law enforcement agents for interrupting Ms. Meloni’s rally in Cagliari.Gianni Cipriano for The New York TimesLike Mr. Salvini, she turned her social media accounts into populist pasta on the wall as she desperately sought traction. In the town of Vinci she accused the French of trying to claim Leonardo da Vinci as one of their own. She went to a grappa distillery to call the president then of the E.U., Jean-Claude Juncker, a drunk. She warned about an “empire” of “invaders” consisting of President Emmanuel Macron of France, Angela Merkel of Germany, Mr. Soros and Wall Street.At her annual political conference in 2018, she hosted Stephen K. Bannon and said that she supported his effort “to build a network that goes beyond the European borders,” and that “I look with interest at the phenomenon of Donald Trump” and at the “phenomenon of Putin in Russia.” She added, “And so the bigger the network gets, the happier I am.”But on the threshold of running Italy, Ms. Meloni has pivoted. After years of fawning over Ms. Le Pen, she is suddenly distancing herself. (“I haven’t got relations with her,” she said.) Same for Mr. Orban. (“I didn’t agree with some positions he had about Ukrainian war.”) She now calls Mr. Putin an anti-Western aggressor and said she would “totally” continue to send offensive arms to Ukraine.But critics say she revealed her true self during a recent speech at a conference supporting Spain’s hard-right Vox party. “There is no possible mediation. Yes to the natural family. No to the L.G.B.T. lobbies,” she bellowed in Spanish. “No to the violence of Islam, yes to safer borders, no to mass immigration, yes to work for our people. No to major international finance.”A supporter of the Brothers of Italy in Cagliari.Gianni Cipriano for The New York Times“The tone, that was very wrong,” she said in the interview. “But it happens to me when I’m very tired,” she said, adding that her passionate delivery “becomes hysteric.”There are things she won’t give up on, including the tricolor flame she inherited as her party symbol. Many historians say it evokes the flickers over the tomb of Mussolini.The flame, she has said, has “nothing to do with fascism but is a recognition of the journey made by the democratic right in our Republican history.”“Don’t extinguish the flame, Giorgia,” a supporter shouted as Ms. Meloni commanded the stage in Cagliari, where she reserved her sharpest invective for leftist attacks that she said tried to depict her as “a monster.”“They don’t scare me,” she screamed above chants of “Giorgia, Giorgia, Giorgia.” “They don’t scare me.” More

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      Draghi’s Fall Reverberates Beyond Italy

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      The downfall of Italy’s prime minister has raised concerns across Europe about the power of populist movements and whether they will erode unity against Russian aggression.ROME — Just over a month ago, Prime Minister Mario Draghi of Italy boarded an overnight train with the leaders of France and Germany bound for Kyiv. During the 10-hour trip, they joked about how the French president had the nicest accommodations. But, more important, they asserted their resolute support for Ukraine in the face of Russian aggression. The pictures of the men tucked in a cabin around a wooden conference table evoked a clubby style of crisis management reminiscent of World War II.The mere fact that Mr. Draghi had a seat at that table reflected how, by the force of his stature and credibility, he had made his country — one saddled by debt and persistent political instability — an equal partner with Europe’s most important powers. Critical to that success was not only his economic bona fides as the former president of the European Central Bank but also his unflinching recognition that Russia’s war presented as an existential challenge to Europe and its values.All of that has now been thrown into jeopardy since a multi-flanked populist rebellion, motivated by an opportunistic power grab, stunningly torpedoed Mr. Draghi’s government this week. Snap elections have been called for September, with polls showing that an alliance dominated by hard-right nationalists and populists is heavily favored to run Italy come the fall.Mr. Draghi’s downfall already amounts to the toppling of the establishment that populist forces across Europe dream of. It has now raised concerns, far transcending Italy, of just how much resilience the movements retain on the continent, and of what damage an Italian government more sympathetic to Russia and less committed to the European Union could do to the cohesion of the West as it faces perhaps its greatest combination of security and economic challenges since the Cold War.“Draghi’s departure is a real problem for Europe, a tough blow,” said Gianfranco Pasquino, professor emeritus of political science at Bologna University. “Draghi had a clear position against the Russian aggression in Ukraine. Europe will lose in compactness because the next prime minister will almost certainly be less convinced that the responsibility for the war lies with Russia.”If there was any question of where the sympathies of European leaders lie in Italy’s power struggle, before his downfall Mr. Draghi received offerings of support from the White House, President Emmanuel Macron of France, Chancellor Olaf Scholz of Germany and others.Mario Draghi, left, and French President Emmanuel Macron examining debris as they visited Irpin, outside Kyiv, Ukraine, last month.Pool photo by Ludovic MarinPrime Minister Pedro Sanchez of Spain wrote “Europe needs leaders like Mario.” When Mr. Draghi made his last-ditch appeal to Italy’s fractious parties to stick with him on Wednesday, Prime Minister Antonio Costa of Portugal wrote him to thank him for reconsidering his resignation, according to a person close to Mr. Draghi.But now, with Mr. Macron lamenting the loss of a “Great Italian statesman,” anxiety has spread around the continent about what will come next.Mr. Draghi’s rebalancing of Italy’s position on Russia is all the more remarkable considering where it started. Italy has among Western Europe’s strongest bonds with Russia. During the Cold War, it was the home of the largest Communist Party in the West, and Italy depended on Russia for more than 40 percent of its gas.Mr. Draghi made it his mission to break that pattern. He leveraged his strong relationship with the U.S. treasury secretary, Janet Yellen, to spearhead the sanctions on the Russian Central Bank.By the example of his public speeches, he pressured his allies, including Mr. Macron, to agree that Ukraine should eventually be a member of the European Union.In the days before the fatal vote in the Senate that brought down his government, Mr. Draghi visited Algeria to announce a gas deal by which that country will supplant Russia as Italy’s biggest gas supplier.Those achievements are now at risk after what started last week as a rebellion within his coalition by the Five Star Movement, an ailing anti-establishment party, ended in a grab for power by conservatives, hard-right populists and nationalists who sensed a clear electoral opportunity, and went for the kill.They abandoned Mr. Draghi in a confidence vote. Now, if Italian voters do not punish them for ending a government that was broadly considered the country’s most capable and competent in years, they may come out on top in elections.Prime Minister Draghi speaking to ministers and Senators on Wednesday, the day his national unity coalition collapsed. Andreas Solaro/Agence France-Presse, via Getty ImagesThe maneuvering by the alliance seemed far from spontaneous.Ahead of the vote, Matteo Salvini, the leader of the hard-right League party, huddled with former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi over a long sweaty lunch at the mogul’s villa on the Appian Way and discussed what to do.Giorgia Meloni, the leader of the Brothers of Italy, a party with post-fascist roots who has incessantly called for elections from the opposition, said she spoke with Mr. Berlusconi a few days earlier and that he had invited her to the meeting as well, but that she demurred, saying it was better they meet after the vote. She said she spoke on the phone with Mr. Salvini only after Mr. Draghi’s speech in parliament.“I didn’t want them to be forced to do what they did,” she said, referring to Mr. Salvini and Mr. Berlusconi, who abandoned Mr. Draghi and collapsed the government. “I knew it would only work if they were sure about leaving that government.”Each has something to be gained in their alliance. Mr. Salvini, the hard right leader of the League party, not long ago the most popular politician in the country, had seen his standing eroded as part of Mr. Draghi’s government, while Ms. Meloni had gobbled up angry support from the opposition, supplanting him now as Italy’s rising political star. Mr. Berlusconi, nearly a political has-been at age 85, was useful and necessary to both, but also could use their coattails to ride back to power.Together, polls show, they have the support of more than 45 percent of voters. That is worrying to many critics of Russia. Mr. Salvini wore shirts with Mr. Putin’s face on them in Moscow’s Red Square and in the European Parliament, his party signed a cooperation deal with Mr. Putin’s Russia United party in 2017.Ms. Meloni, in what some analysts see as a cunning move to distinguish herself from Mr. Salvini and make herself a more acceptable candidate for prime minister, has emerged as a strong supporter of Ukraine.League leader Matteo Salvini and Brothers of Italy leader Giorgia Meloni meeting with with Silvio Berlusconi, right, in October 2021.Guglielmo Mangiapane/ReutersMr. Berlusconi used to host Mr. Putin’s daughters at his Sardinian villa and was long Mr. Putin’s closest ally in Western Europe. But now, some of Mr. Berlusconi’s longtime backers say, he has forgotten his European values and crossed the Rubicon to the nationalist and Putin-enabling side.Renato Brunetta, Italy’s Minister for Public Administration, and a long time member of former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi’s Forza Italia, quit the party after it joined with the populist League party in withdrawing support from Mr. Draghi and destroying the government.He said he left because Mr. Berlusconi’s decision to abandon the government was irresponsible and antithetical to the values of the party over the last 30 years. Asked whether he believed Mr. Berlusconi, sometimes shaky, was actually lucid enough to make the decision, he said “it would be even more grave” if he was.Italy, long a laboratory for European politics, has also been the incubator for the continent’s populism and transformation of hard-right movements into mainstream forces.When Mr. Berlusconi entered politics, largely to protect his business interests in the 1990s, he cast himself as a pro-business, and moderate, conservative. But in order to cobble together a winning coalition, he had brought in the League and a post-fascist party that would become Ms. Meloni’s.Now the situation has inverted. Ms. Meloni and Mr. Salvini need Mr. Berlusconi’s small electoral support in order to win elections and form a government. They are in charge.“It is a coalition of the right, because it is not center-right anymore,” said Mr. Brunetta. “It’s a right-right coalition with sovereigntist tendencies, extremist and Putin-phile.”Supporters of Mr. Draghi take some solace in the fact that he will stick around in a limited caretaker capacity until the next government is seated, with control over issues related to the pandemic, international affairs — including Ukraine policy — and the billions of euros in recovery funds from Europe. That money is delivered in tranches, and strict requirements need to be met before the funds are released.Supporters of Mr. Draghi acknowledged that major new overhauls on major problems such as pensions were now off the table, but they argued that the recovery funds were more or less safe because no government, not even a hard-right populist one, would walk away from all that money, and so would follow through on Mr. Draghi’s vision for modernization funded by those euros.But if the last week has shown anything, it is that political calculations sometimes outweigh the national interest.Supporters of Prime Minister Draghi demonstrating in Milan on Monday.Mourad Balti Touati/EPA, via ShutterstockThe government’s achievements are already “at risk” over the next months of Mr. Draghi’s limited powers, said Mr. Brunetta, but if the nationalist front won, he said, “obviously it will be even worse.”Mr. Brunetta said Mr. Draghi arrived on the political scene in the first place because there was a “crisis of the traditional parties” in Italy. He said that the 17 months in government, and the support it garnered in the public, showed that there was “a Draghian constituency,” which wanted moderate, pragmatic and value-based governance.The problem, he said, was there were “no political parties, or especially a coalition, to represent them” and he hoped one could be born before the election but “there was little time.”And in the meantime, he said, some things were for sure. Italy had lost influence in Europe and the continent would suffer, too, for the loss of Mr. Draghi.“Europe,” he said, “is weakened.”Gaia Pianigiani More

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      Draghi Offers Resignation for 2nd Time

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      After the collapse of his national unity government, Prime Minister Mario Draghi of Italy went to the president to step down again, deepening the country’s political crisis.ROME — Prime Minister Mario Draghi of Italy offered to resign again on Thursday, a day after a last-ditch effort to persuade the country’s fractious parties to stick together for the benefit of the nation failed spectacularly, with nationalist and populist forces reuniting to fatally torpedo his national unity government.Mr. Draghi had “tendered his resignation again” — for the second time in a little over a week — a statement from the office of President Sergio Mattarella said, adding that Mr. Mattarella “took note” of the decision and that, in the meantime, “the government remains in charge of regular business.”Mr. Mattarella had rejected Mr. Draghi’s resignation last week in the hopes that Mr. Draghi could yet persuade Italy’s bickering parties to hang together. Mr. Draghi gave it a shot on Wednesday, when he made his case to Parliament, arguing that “the only way forward, if we want to stay together, is to rebuild from the top this pact, with courage, altruism and credibility.”But with elections looming, Italy’s parties decided not to go forward, but to explode what was widely considered one of the most stable, effective and influential Italian governments in many years to try to gain political advantage and take power for themselves.The effective collapse of Mr. Draghi’s government amounted to a devastating blow to both Italy and Europe. Already on Thursday, financial markets were reacting negatively to the imminent departure of Mr. Draghi, a former president of the European Central Bank who helped save the euro, and who, by the force of his credibility, had increased investor confidence in his debt-laden country.If Mr. Draghi showed a rare flash of ire on Wednesday, as it became clear that the unity he called for was not coming, he struck a more conciliatory tone as he spoke in the lower house of Parliament on Thursday morning.“First of all, thank you,” Mr. Draghi said to an extended standing ovation, though not from the League and Five Star Movement parties, which refused to cast a ballot for him in Wednesday’s confidence vote and essentially pulled the plug on his government.As the applause faded, he joked that sometimes even a banker’s heart beat, and then he read a short note saying that “in light of yesterday’s vote” in the Senate, he would suspend the proceedings until his meeting with Mr. Mattarella. He then went to the president’s official residence at the Quirinal Palace and resigned. Mr. Mattarella, who is imbued with extraordinary powers during a government crisis, is expected to speak later in the day to provide some clarity about his vision for the weeks and months ahead, including whether he will call for early elections and whether Mr. Draghi will leave or stay on in the interim.Mr. Draghi’s statesmanlike stature had ushered in a brief golden period for Italy after he took over as caretaker prime minister in 2021, and in his speech on Wednesday, he said that the broad unity coalition had allowed Italy to get out of the worst phase of the pandemic, funnel financial assistance quickly to those who needed it and cut “useless bureaucracy.”He also listed key overhauls in a variety of sectors, including increased energy independence from Russia, which he called “essential for the modernization of Italy,” and noted that Rome had already received 45.9 billion euros (about $47 billion) from the European Commission in recovery funds, with €21 billion more on the way.Under Mr. Draghi, Italy assumed a much greater footprint in Europe. He persuaded the country, historically close and economically tied to Russia, to take a strong position backing Ukraine with arms, to stake out a leading role in recognizing Kyiv’s application for membership to the European Union and to condemn Russian aggression and punish Moscow with sanctions.Many supporters of Mr. Draghi had argued that this injection of stability and competence into Italy’s politics, and the moderation required to work together in a national unity government, had essentially inoculated the country from its populist fever.Instead, Italy was headed for elections in which the most popular politician, Giorgia Meloni, leads a party with neo-fascist roots that has skyrocketed in popularity to 22 percent in the polls, from less than 5 percent in the last election in 2018.Unlike Ms. Meloni, who launched campaign bombs from the opposition, her nominal ally, Matteo Salvini of the League party, had entered the national unity government, in part to satisfy his pro-business base in the country’s north, which liked Mr. Draghi.But on Wednesday, with elections approaching, Mr. Salvini’s patience wore out and he prompted the collapse of Mr. Draghi’s government, apparently eager to get back on campaign footing, win back the popularity that Ms. Meloni has taken from him and show that he should be the country’s next prime minister.Whoever comes out on top, Mr. Salvini and Ms. Meloni have formed an alliance, along with former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, that is heavily favored to prevail in the elections, which could come as early as the end of September or the beginning of October.While political experts here say Ms. Meloni has sought to soften her image and seem more amenable to more moderate voters ahead of the elections, including positioning herself in the European mainstream as an ardent supporter of Ukraine and a tough critic of Russia’s aggression. But Mr. Salvini and Mr. Berlusconi both have long records of admiring and even venerating Mr. Putin, injecting a familiar dose of uncertainty into Italy’s foreign policy.On Thursday afternoon, President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine wrote on Twitter that he was “sincerely grateful” to Mr. Draghi for “unwavering support” of Ukraine against Russian aggression. He added “I’m convinced” that Italy’s active support of Ukraine “will continue!” More