From ‘War Criminal’ to ‘Statesman’
by Robert Fisk
25 Marzo 2008
An Italian restaurant in the Irish village of Dalkey caused quite a kerfuffle when it opened a few months ago. It is called Benito’s and - yes - it is indeed named after Il Duce. And there are Italian fascist newspaper front pages on the wall to remind you just how bravely his men fought in the Second World War. A 1941 cover of La Domenica del Corriere carries a dramatic painting of six RAF Hurricanes crashing into the rooftops of Malta after vainly taking on the Italian air force. On another front page of the same year, four frightened British Tommies - a few of the 19,000 captured in the siege of Tobruk - surrender to black-feathered Bersaglieri troops at Sollum on the Egyptian-Libyan border.
It’s not a joke. A relative of the owner was an Italian air force officer in the Western Desert and there are archive photographs, too, on the wall. A handsome young airman is surrounded by photos of sand …
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