The Portella della Ginestra massacre refers to the killing of 11 people and 27 wounded during May Day celebrations in Sicily on 1 May 1947, in the municipality of Piana degli Albanesi.

From May 1893, during the period of the Fasci Siciliani, the peasants of the neighbouring towns of Piana degli Albanesi, San Giuseppe Jato and San Cipirello used to gather at Portella della Ginestra for the Labour Day celebrations at the initiative of the physician and peasant leader Nicola Barbato, who used to speak to the crowd from a big rock that was later called "Barbato's Stone".

[2][3] The massacre took place twelve days after a surprise victory by the People's Block (Blocco del popolo) – a coalition of the Italian Communist Party (Partito Comunista Italiano, PCI) and the Italian Socialist Party (Partito Socialista Italiano, PSI) – in the elections for the Constituent Assembly of the autonomous region of Sicily on April 20–21, 1947.

[1] With national elections set for October 1947, the leftist victory in Sicily created speculation that a coalition led by Palmiro Togliatti might bring Italy under communist rule.

In Sicily, the leader of the Sicilian branch of the communists, Girolamo Li Causi, pledged to redistribute large land holdings, but to preserve any sized 100 hectares (247 acres) or less.

[4] On 1 May 1947, hundreds of mostly poor peasants gathered at Portella della Ginestra, three kilometers from the town of Piana degli Albanesi on the way to San Giuseppe Jato for the traditional international Labour Day parade.

Eleven people were killed, including four children, Serafino Lascari (15), Giovanni Grifò (12), Giuseppe Di Maggio (13) and Vincenza La Fata (8).

The shooting of children and peasants at Ginestra, however, outraged his former admirers, and a bounty of three million lire ($13,200 in 1947, $150,000 in 2019) was offered by the Italian government for Giuliano's capture.

According to newspaper reports hints at the possibility of civil war were heard as Communist leaders harangued meetings of 6,000,000 workers who struck throughout Italy in protest against the May Day massacre in Sicily.

[6][8] The Minister of the Interior, the Christian Democrat Mario Scelba, reported to Parliament the next day that so far as the police could determine, the Portella della Ginestra shooting was non-political.

[6][9] Li Causi disagreed and charged that the Mafia had perpetrated the attack, in cahoots with the large landowners, monarchists and the rightist Common Man's Front.

[13] At the trial for the Portella della Ginestra massacre, Gaspare Pisciotta said: Those who have made promises to us are called Bernardo Mattarella, Prince Alliata, the monarchist MP Marchesano and also Signor Scelba, Minister for Home Affairs … it was Marchesano, Prince Alliata and Bernardo Mattarella who ordered the massacre of Portella di Ginestra.

Before the massacre they met Giuliano…" However the MPs Mattarella, Alliata and Marchesano were declared innocent by the Court of Appeal of Palermo, at a trial which dealt with their alleged role in the event.

Leftists who were the victims of the attack have blamed the landed barons and the Mafia; significantly, the memorial plaque erected by them makes no mention of Giuliano or his band: On May 1, 1947, while celebrating the working class festival and the victory of April 20, men, women and children of Piana, S. Cipirello and S. Giuseppe fell under the bullets of the Mafia and the landed barons to crush the struggle of the peasants against feudalism.

A few weeks before the massacre, the local Mafia boss of Piana, Francesco Cuccia, and others had asked landowners for money to "put an end to the communists once and for all."

When the gunfire sound effects started, the crowd panicked and knocked over one of the cameras in rush to escape; women wept and knelt in prayer; men threw themselves to the ground in agony.

Sicilian author and playwright Beatrice Monroy wrote a poem to commemorate the tragedy, "Portella della Ginestra: Indice dei nomi proibiti" (2005).

She retells the massacre from the point of view of the victims and their feelings of despair and thirst for justice, as a song of sorrow for the downtrodden of the earth, and as a crime whose instigators are still officially unknown.