(ANSA) - ROME, DEC 7 - La Scala Superintendent Dominique Meyer said the premiere of Verdi's Forza del Destino Saturday, a work whose anti-war message is unmistakeable, would send an invitation for world peace.
    "With all our strength we would like a return to peace", he said ahead of the opening night, the high point of the Milanese social year.
    "There are a crazy number of wars in the world and every time peace is found it is a victory for humanity. "But at the moment we cannot be very optimistic".
    Protesters against the war in Gaza dumped manure on the red carpet and set up inside it photos of Italian government ministers and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
    La Forza del Destino is popularly said to bring bad luck.
    High jumper Gianmarco Tamberi, who saw his dream of retaining his Olympic title dashed by ill health in Paris last summer, quipped to journalists, looking super smart in an Armani suit with his wife: "I swear to you, I didn't see this show before Paris". (ANSA).