Page 2, 12th December 2008

12th December 2008

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Page 2, 12th December 2008 — Open archives on Pius, says Jewish expert on Holocaust
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Open archives on Pius, says Jewish expert on Holocaust

BY ED WEST
A LEADING British Jewish historian has called on the Vatican to open its archives to prove that Pope Pius XII helped to save Jews during the Second World War.
Sir Martin Gilbert, author of The Righteous: The Unsung Heroes of the Holocaust, in which he defended the wartime pontiff, argued in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz that the Vatican should follow the example of Britain in opening its wartime files.
He said: "Pope Benedict XVI asks that the public debate about the canonisation of Pius XII wait until he makes an official statement. As, however, the Vatican has cited me as a supporter of Pius XII's candidacy on this issue. I feel I should explain my view. It is this: if the Vatican feels today, as Pope John Paul II felt, that the Pope's behaviour during the Holocaust merits particular recognition, it should send — as I have several times urged — to the Righteous Among the Nations Department at Yad Vashem the notarised material — the evidence in the Vatican archives — on which to base an application for him to be made a Righteous Gentile."
Sir Martin was invited to the Vatican in 2004 to discuss Pius KIT's Cause but he declined.
Yad Vashem recognises 21,000 Righteous .Gentiles, about half of whom are Catholics, including over 6,000 Poles. Sir Martin said that the memorial in Jerusalem would respond to any material sent by the Vatican. as only archives up to 1939 are currently accessible, and they will have to wait until 2013 for the rest.
"Like many historians," Sir Martin wrote , "I have long urged the Vatican to open its wartime archive . The British government long ago opened its files with regard to Britain's response to the Holocaust, and has accepted whatever the documentation reveals. There are many historical episodes in which the evidence of the Pope's positive involvement will be confirmed or negated by the documents in the Vatican archives.
"One is the refuge given to 477 Jews in Vatican City and its enclaves on the eve of the German roundup of Jews in Rome in 1943. A further 4,238 Jews were saved when they were given sanctuary in monasteries and convents throughout the city. Among those in Rome at that time already recognised by Yad Vashem was Fr Pietro Palazzini, later a cardinal. Only the Vatican archives can reveal what part the Pope himself played in these two acts of rescue, which saved four fifths of the Jews of Rome."
The issue of Pius's Cause has caused tension between the Church and some Jews. Last month the Vatican opened an exhibit on Pius highlighting his actions on behalf of Jews and describing him as a "defender of peace". However, a caption at the Yad Vashem states that the pontiff did not do enough to save Jews.
Sir Martin, Sir Winston Churchill's official biographer and author of 70 books, also pointed out that Nazi leaders, especially Catholic-raised propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels, considered the Pope to have sided with the Jews after the Pope denounced racial crimes in his 1942 Christmas broadcast. Opening the archives would show whether this was the intention, and whether individual Catholic initiatives to save Jews were sanctioned from above.
"When senior Roman Catholic Church leaders in Vichy France denounced the deportation of Jews and urged their flocks to hide and save them, did Pius initiate that, or support it? Only the Vatican archive holds the answer," he said. "When the papal nuncio in Budapest worked tirelessly in 1944 to help save Jews from Arrow Cross massacre, did Pius XII initiate this act of rescue, or support it? Only the Vatican archive holds the answer. When — encouraged by Chaim Barlas of the Jewish Agency — the papal nuncio in Istanbul, the future Pope John XXIII, successfully pressed the Bulgarian king not to deport Jews to Germany, did Pius XII initiate this act of rescue, or support it? Only the Vatican archive holds the answer for it contains the complete two-way correspondence between the Vatican and its emissaries overseas."
John Cornwell, author of the critical biography Hitler's Pope, said: "I tend to think that Gilbert's assessment is fair, and in accordance with my own revised opinion. Except that I would go fin/hen even if it can be shown through new documentation that Pius did less than many claim, it could still be argued (although hardly proved) that his inactions and silences were for fear of causing more harm to Jews and others. He had very little freedom of action in the depths of the war, and it now seems certain that in the event of Pius speaking out at the time of the Jewish ghetto round-up Hitler had planned to enter the Vatican, putting the lives of those in hiding there at risk."




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