Elia Enrico Picciotto was born in Istanbul in 1920 to a family originally from Aleppo, but of Italian nationality. The Picciotto family was connected to the ancient Sephardic Jewish community of Livorno, from which their ancestors had expanded over the centuries, establishing roots in North Africa and the Middle East and benefitting from privileges and commercial agreements that ensured their freedom of movement. After the fall of the Ottoman Empire, Elia Enrico’s father, Raffaele Picciotto, took on the role of general inspector of public debt, a position that led him and his family to frequently move across several countries. In 1914, Raffaele and his wife Latife married in Aleppo, but shortly after the wedding, they moved to Baghdad, where their first son, Ezra Vittorio, was born in 1915.
The following year, the family settled in Istanbul, where three more children were born: Isacco Alberto in 1917, Elia Enrico in 1920, and Daniele Emilio in 1922. In 1924, Raffaele Picciotto decided to move to Milan with his wife and children to reunite with one of his brothers, who had been living there for some time. In Milan, he started a business in the textile trade with his two other brothers, one living in Cairo and the other in Brussels.
Elia Enrico was only four years old when he arrived in Italy, a country where he immediately felt at home, as he already spoke the language and was familiar with its culture. As he grew, his sense of belonging to Italy strengthened, especially through his schooling in Milan. However, in 1935, his family faced yet another move. His father went to Cairo to settle his late brother’s business affairs. The matter, however, proved to be more complex than expected, causing Raffaele to stay in Egypt for an extended period. Meanwhile, the situation for Jews in Europe became increasingly uncertain and dangerous, prompting the family to decide to move to Cairo, where Raffaele continued to run the textile business.
Here in Europe, the situation was what it was
Transcript
Interviewer:
Why did your father decide to go to Egypt?
Enrico Elia Picciotto:
[He went] to Egypt because he and his brother who lived in Cairo were business partners. His brother died and he had to go there to liquidate [the business], and since the liquidation couldn’t be done in one day, he stayed there for a long time. Meanwhile, here in Europe, the situation was what it was. A friend of ours, a friend of my parents, who was a high-ranking Italian general, came to my mother one day and said, “Listen, if you want to be sure you’ll always be with your husband, either he returns here”—he had been gone for six months and was still there—“or [you go there].”
In Elia Enrico’s recollections, during World War II, the family did not face particular difficulties in Egypt. He continued attending the Italian school in Cairo and later enrolled at the London School of Economics, a British university that also had a branch in the Egyptian capital. Elia Enrico mostly socialized with other Italians, both Jewish and non-Jewish, with whom he often took short trips, visited the Gezira Sporting Club, or attended parties at the Auberge de Pyramides.
Immediately after the proclamation of the State of Israel in 1948, the Picciotto family was expelled from Egypt and returned to Italy. Elia Enrico clearly remembers their arrival in Milan. They struggled to find accommodation for the night, and when they finally settled into a hotel in the city center, he witnessed the turmoil that followed the assassination attempt on Palmiro Togliatti (leader of the Communist Party) in July 1948.
It was Pallante’s attack on Togliatti
Transcript
Elia Enrico Picciotto:
We arrived in Milan at 10 PM and began searching for a hotel, but we couldn’t find one, nothing. Then we finally found accommodation at the Hotel Commercio, which no longer exists. Do you know it?
Interviewer:
Can you recall the street or area where the hotel was?
Elia Enrico Picciotto:
It was in the Piazza Fontana. It was already midnight when we arrived. At 7 AM, we started hearing machine guns, sirens, and police. I opened the window, and there was chaos in the Piazza del Duomo; they were shooting on sight. It was Pallante’s attack on Togliatti.
Rebuilding a new life in Italy was not easy, but the family was able to rely on its own resources without seeking assistance from the Italian Jewish community. At that time, Italian Jewish communities were engaged in the slow and difficult process of reconstruction after the war and persecution. Elia Enrico particularly recalls the Via Unione, which was a crucial place both for the recovery of Jewish institutions and for assisting the many foreign Jewish refugees passing through Italy in the post-war years.
Many people passed through the Via Unione
Transcript
Interviewer:
When you arrived in Milan, were you helped by any Jewish organizations? Did you reach out to the community?
Elia Enrico Picciotto:
No, we didn’t need it. We probably didn’t need it. I know there was a community in the Via Unione. Do you remember it?
Interviewer:
So, did you have any contact with the Via Unione?
Elia Enrico Picciotto:
There was the Temple there.
Interviewer:
Did you go to the Temple?
Elia Enrico Picciotto:
Yes, we went there.
Interviewer:
So, in ’48 there was still a community that had to be organized, and it was full of refugees.
Elia Enrico Picciotto:
Yes, very full. I wasn’t involved, but many people passed through the Via Unione, many people passed through.
