Rome LGBT+ Pride bans Jewish LGBT+ groups for failing to be vocal enough about Gaza

Italy’s largest LGBT+ pride parade has announced that it has refused to accept the participation of Italy’s most prominent Jewish LGBT+ organisation because it “failed to distance itself from the ongoing genocide in Gaza.”

The Rome Pride Parade, scheduled to take place next month with hundreds of thousands of participants, announced that Keshet Italia and Keshet Europe would not be welcome to join, as reported by Times of Israel.

A statement from the parade organisers shared on social media read:

“Anyone who shares the founding values of our movement and our community can join us in the streets. Participation of a float in the Roma Pride therefore presupposes — regardless of the sexual orientation, identity, religion, ethnicity, or nationality of those aboard — a clear and unequivocal stance condemning the genocide perpetrated by the Israeli government.”

“We are fully capable of distinguishing between the Israeli government and the Jewish community, made up of both LGBTQIA+ and non-LGBTQIA+ people, and we could never attribute to the latter responsibility for the criminal acts of war carried out by a genocidal government,” it adds. “We do, however, hold Keshet Italia responsible for having failed, and continue to fail, to distance itself from the ongoing genocide in Gaza.”

Keshet Italia responded by saying that “the Roma Pride has shown its true colours. Our crime? To be Jewish.

“This is just the last step on a hostile path. Last year, during the parade, we received explicit antisemitic attacks, and the Roma Pride chose to remain silent, refusing to condemn them. Today, that silence has become active complicity.”

The Italian Jewish LGBT+ organisation has previously stated that “while the conflict in the region is not our area of expertise, we feel close to the suffering of the Palestinian people. However, we ask people to be careful with the language used to refer to this war.”

It went on to say that “the word ‘genocide’ is not neutral; it evokes a specific historic [occurrence]. We are especially concerned with the sentence that we keep on hearing that ‘the Jewish people are carrying out what they were subjected to,’ a sentence that does not just refer to a conflict or a government but ends up connecting what is happening to the whole Jewish people.”

A few weeks ago, as reported by Jewish News, Brussels Pride withdrew a requirement that a Jewish Belgian LGBT+ group could only join the event if their banners did not include a Star of David, or even the use of the word “Jewish”.

And in 2024 and 2025, there was no official Jewish representation at London Pride, with Keshet UK stating last year that they had met the organisers “simply looking for reassurance that British Jews would be physically and psychologically safe at the event amidst rapidly rising antisemitism and LGBT+ related hate crime in the UK. Our requests were turned down.”