La Russa feels 'closeness to Jews' at Yad Vashem (2)

(ANSA) - ROME, MAR 6 - Italy's Senate Speaker Ignazio La Russa on Monday expressed his "closeness to the Jewish people" after visiting Yad Vashem, the Holocaust memorial centre in Jerusalem.
    "Every time I have symbolically knelt in this place of pain and remembrance, I have renewed the feeling of closeness to the Jewish people and my intention to help ensure that there will never again be such bestial hatred," La Russa wrote in the Book of Remembrance at the end of his visit.
    Earlier Italy's second-highest ranking State official rekindled the Eternal Flame in the Hall of Remembrance in memory of the six million Jews killed during the Holocaust.
    He also visited the Children's Memorial, a tribute specifically to the approximately 1.5 million Jewish children who lost their lives.
    Later in the day La Russa visited the Knesset, Israel's parliament, that said the reception he received was compensation for the "many small difficulties" during his political career.
    "The welcome I received in your Parliament, the joint applause not only from the majority but also from the opposition, makes up for the many small difficulties one may have in one's political life," La Russa told the Jewish community of Italian origin in Jerusalem.
    "My outright condemnation of the Racial Laws goes back a long way, and ever since I have been in politics the defense of the existence, integrity and independence of Israel has been a cornerstone of the political line of the parties to which I have belonged," the Senate Speaker added.
    The Racial Laws imposed by Italy's Fascist government in 1938 introduced racial discrimination and segregation, particularly for Jews.
    La Russa began his political career in the Movimento Sociale Italiano (MSI), a party formed in 1946 by supporters of the late Fascist leader Benito Mussolini, and is now a top exponent of right-wing Fratelli d'Italia led by Premier Giorgia Meloni.
    (ANSA).