Rabbi Criticizes Silence of Pope Pius Xii on Nazi Annihilation of Jews

Sharp criticism of the late Pope Pius XII was leveled here today by Rabbi Joseph Litvin, one-time professor of history at the University of Moscow, a prominent British Zionist who is now editor of the Zionist Yearbook. He made his criticism in a letter to the Daily Telegraph in connection with the production running at the Aldwych Theatre here of “The Representative. ” That play has been attacked by many Catholics because it blames the late Pontiff for failing to protest publicly against Hitler’s mass annihilation of European Jewry.

Stating that other leaders had taken action, while Pope Pius remained silent, Rabbi Litvin declared: “The reactionary Prime Minister of Rumania, Antonescu, saved Jews in certain Rumanian districts from extermination. King Boris, of Bulgaria, an ally of the Nazis, whose country was occupied by the Germans, saved the Jews of Bulgaria. King Christian of Denmark did his utmost to save the Danish Jews; he openly opposed anti-Semitism; he was not punished by the Germans.”

Asserting that Hitler and the Nazis never ceased reckoning with public opinion in certain countries, Rabbi Litvin stated: “There were 35,000,000 devout Roman Catholics in Hitler’s Greater Germany. How can one doubt that, had Pope Pius threatened Germany with interdiction, a million Jews would have been saved?”