Who is Rula Jebreal
Rula is a foreign policy analyst, journalist, novelist and screenwriter, who is now a visiting professor at the University of Miami, where she lectures on Propaganda, Persuasion and Genocide.
As a journalist, Rula was the first in the history of Italian television to anchor the evening news. She worked for Italy’s La7 and Rai News 24. Rula was also an analyst and journalist on Italian TV 12 years, and we were sorry to see you go Rula.
Her work has been published in the NYT, Foreign Policy, WaPo, the Daily Beast and in many other national and international publications.
The Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing: Italy’s slide into autocracy
I asked Rula Jebreal to join us to talk about the rise of radical right populism in Italy, and what the up-coming elections really mean to the health of Italian democracy in the future among other issues.
Owing to her expertise in global politics and years and years as an Italian journalist, Rula was able to bring her experience and analysis to our discussion.
She debated Giorgia Meloni, the head of Brothers of Italy, on national TV back in 2016, when Meloni was whitewashing and downplaying Trump’s outlandish comments during his presidential campaign. Along with Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Olga Lautman and a few others, Rula was sounding the alarm and she explains why in our conversation.
But it’s not just about Italy: Rula also touches on the overt path to authoritarianism the current GOP is on, and how we as citizens can act to shore up our democracies.
We’d like to thank Rula for sharing her time and indepth knowledge with us. I was personally thrilled to speak with her as her commitment to democracy in the US and in Europe means she is fighting on the front lines every day.
Further reading
Tranlation of tweet below: “Today the Unione Popolare is parading in Bologna against the war and NATO, against those who say we must make sacrifices to finance arms supplies and an increase in military spending, against those who impose a war economy on us and then permit speculation on our bills.”
Ruth Ben-Ghiat, Crowds and Power- Lucid
Crowds have a starring role in the propaganda generated over a century of authoritarian history. Throngs listening to the leader at a rally, performing gymnastics for him and party officials (a Communist specialty), or lining the streets to cheer his motorcade - these are all "good crowds." In authoritarian states and declining democracies, good crowds exist in relation to dangerous ones, like the hordes of foreigners reportedly breaching U.S. borders, or protesters said to be committing violent acts. Democratic erosion and the criminalization of dissent go hand in hand.
Jason Horowitz, Giorgia Meloni May Lead Italy, and Europe Is Worried-NYT
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.
International 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.”
[…]
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.”
Trump’s latest propaganda video
There are so many similitaries to the radical-right wing coalition propaganda of the Italian elections and the main messages presented in Trump’s latest propaganda video. This is why I have stated time and again that the Meloni coalition has far more affinities with the radicalised wing of the GOP and Orban-affiliated allies than President Biden’s Atlanticist position and the nations that believe in keeping the European Union together.
KF/EF- Wolf in Sheep's Clothing: Italy's slide into autocracy with Rula Jebreal