The Holocaust by bullets

On Monday evening, 18 January 2010, the day after the Pope’s historic visit to the Rome Synagogue, another historic visit occurred. Representatives from the Chief Rabbinate of Israel, prelates from the Vatican, and nine ambassadors to the Holy See came to the Pontifical Gregorian University in Rome to listen to a French Catholic priest, Father Patrick Desbois. They heard him describe how he has spent the last decade criss-crossing Ukraine to find the truth about how 1.5 million Ukrainian Jews were shot dead and buried in mass graves during the Second World War. Pictured here, left to right, are Tom Casey SJ, President of the Cardinal Bea Centre for Judaic Studies, who led the evening, Fr Patrick Desbois, and the Chief Rabbi of Florence, Rabbi Joseph Levi, who also works part-time in the Cardinal Bea Centre with Tom.