Pius Document Found

ROME — The Vatican last week produced another document to bolster its assertion that Pope Pius XII worked behind the scenes to save Jews in World War II. Vatican Radio said a 1943 document found in a convent in Rome listed the names of 24 people who were to be sheltered by nuns there, in accordance with the pope’s desire. Vatican Radio said the document was dated November 1943, just weeks after German occupiers deported 2,000 Roman Jews to Auschwitz. The Vatican said the document provides written evidence of Pius’ directives. Jewish critics and other historians have said Pius turned a blind eye to the fate of Jews in the Shoah and want Pope Benedict to delay Pius’ beatification until the issue is clarified.

Italy Nixes Durban II

BRUSSELS — Italy is pulling out of the Durban II UN anti-racism conference. Foreign Minister Franco Frattini disclosed the decision March 5 in Brussels, where he was attending a meeting of NATO foreign ministers. Frattini said the decision was made because of “aggressive phrases of an anti-Semitic nature” that were “totally unacceptable” in the draft of a final document to be approved at the Durban Review Conference, which takes place April 20-24 in Geneva. He said the statements “must be eliminated,” and that Italy would not take part unless the draft document is changed. The United States has set the same condition, but Israel and Canada have withdrawn.

Iranian Assets Seized

BUENOS AIRES —  Argentina seized five Iranian properties in the Buenos Aires area last week. Justice Minister Alberto Nisman, who heads a probe of the 1994 AMIA Jewish community centre bombing, ordered the seizure. He said the seizure, along with six other Iranian properties seized in 2008, will meet the demands of attack victims’ relatives and survivors. If the Iranian owner of the property is found guilty in the attack, his property will be sold and the money given to the victims’ survivors. A survivor who was severely injured in the attack on the Buenos Aires centre is seeking $1 million in a civil action. The survivor says the attack was planned by former leaders of Iran and carried out by the Lebanon-based group Hezbollah.

Muslim Man Fined For Killing Jew

SANAA — A Yemen court ruled that a Muslim convicted of killing a Yemeni Jew is mentally incompetent and ordered him to pay a fine.
Retired Yemen air force pilot Abdul Aziz Yahya Hamoud al-Abdi, 39, must pay a fine of about $250,000 (US), the court ruled March 2, for the December murder of Moshe Yaish Nahari, a Hebrew teacher and father of nine.
Abdi had shouted “I am not mad” in the courtroom after his attorneys presented an insanity defence – the same defence that saved him from prison five years ago after he killed his wife. Abdi had told police that he had sent a message to Jews in the neighbourhood that they should either convert to Islam or be killed.
Following the murder, the government last month paid to relocate the Jews living in Amran to the capital of Sanaa in order to better protect the community. Some Jews were refusing to move. A few hundred Jews still live in Yemen.