Sometimes religious news comes from surprising places, so when I found this in Politico, I read with great interest just exactly HOW the media missed the true significance of Benedict's visit to the Great Synagogue in Rome (and the Jewish Museum).
 
It's a fair, balanced piece (coming from a somewhat left-of-center political site), and well worth your time to read. It also includes information on the wartime effort by Pius XII to help the Jews....
 
http://www.politicsdaily.com/2010/01/18/at-popes-trip-to-rome-synagogue-press-mi sses-the-story/
 

Quote from fair-minded know it all on Jan 23^rd, 2010, 7:00pm:

 
If the only defense that YOU have are relatively-underarmed Swiss Guards for the nation-state of the Vatican, you do tend to work through back channels in order to get anything accomplished. I always assumed that after the Italians sided with Hitler that Pius XII would have HAD to do so, if only to avoid invasion (a matter of perhaps hours).