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Vatican expert: Suspend Pius beatification process during Holocaust probe By HAIM SHAPIRO

JERUSALEM (October 20) - Vatican expert Dr. Itzhak Minerbi, of the Hebrew University's Institute of Contemporary Judaism, yesterday welcomed the idea of setting up a joint Jewish-Catholic commission of scholars to investigate the activities of the Vatican relating to the Holocaust. But he warned that if the scholarly investigation is to have any meaning, the beatification process for Pius XII will have to be suspended while the commission works.

Minerbi also expressed his fears that the scholars will be limited to delving into the 11 volumes of Vatican sources compiled by four Jesuit priests in the 1980s, searching for omissions. Minerbi spoke after examining the communique issued by the Vatican yesterday officially announcing the establishment of the joint commission.

According to the communique, the scholars will "review published volumes of church archival material covering the World War II period."

It also said that Cardinal Edward Cassidy, president of the Holy See's Commission for Religious Relations with the Jews, and Seymour Reich, chairman of the International Jewish Committee on Interreligious Consultations (IJCIC), who together announced the agreement to set up the joint commission, "expressed the hope that any question and differences that now exist or may arise can be resolved through the joint review approach."

The communique said the scholars are expected to raise relevant questions and issues that had not been resolved by the 11 volumes and to issue a report.

"Usually scholars look into archives for documents kept in those archives. Now they will be looking into published books to find out what has been omitted," Minerbi said.

He added that even if the scholars identify a document as having been omitted, it is not clear what will happen.Will the document be produced for the scholars, and if it is, will the Vatican allow it to be published.

He added that the idea of having Jewish and Catholic scholars working together is a good one.

So far, Minerbi said, the Vatican official history appears to be working to preserve the memory of Pius XII. This attempt to justify the silence of Pius XII, he said, is unfair to the church people who, with great danger and sometime at the cost of their lives, raised their voices against persecution.

Gerhard Riegner, the World Jewish Congress representative in Geneva during World War II who is now honorary vice president of the WJC, said in Rome yesterday that the establishment of the team is a positive step aimed at establishing the truth. In his recently published memoirs, Riegner pointed out that a secret cable warning of German plans to kill millions of Jews with poison gas, which he sent to the pope shortly after the infamous Wannsee Conference, was omitted from the 11 volumes.

"The aim of the research is to ascertain whether documentation published by the Vatican is complete and eventually to find what has been omitted and must be added in order to establish the objective truth about the position of the Vatican towards the Jewish community in World War II. If it is not complete, they may ask for the opening of the archives for further clarification," Riegner said.

Meanwhile, Father Pierre Blet, the last surviving member of the team which compiled the 11 volumes, had pointed out on earlier occasion that that group had not been primarily interested in the activities of the Vatican in relation to the Jews.

"Our purpose was to show how Pius XII worked for peace during World War II, not specifically to show how he saved Jewish lives," Blet said.

(Lisa Palmieri-Billig contributed to this report.) -The Jerusalem Post Wednesday, October 20, 1999