page_title: DELASEM
section_title: The Rome DELASEM
hierarchical_section_title: DELASEM / The Underground during the Italian Social Republic (1943-45) / The Rome DELASEM
caption_attribution_description: Le Père Marie-Benoit "Le Père des Juifs" (°30 Mars 1895, + 5 février 1990)
context_page_description: Delegation for the Assistance of Jewish Emigrants or DELASEM, was an Italian and Jewish resistance organization that worked in Italy between 1939 and 1947. It is estimated that during World War II, DELASEM was able to distribute more than $1,200,000 in aid, of which nearly $900,000 came from outside Italy.
context_section_description: Regular contacts with Rome, Genoa (and central funding in Switzerland) were interrupted abruptly with the arrest and flight to Switzerland of Raffaele Cantoni. The office Lungo Tevere Sanzio had to be closed but DELASEM continued to operate in Rome until the liberation under the leadership of the Jewish delegates Septimius Sorani, Giuseppe Levi, and the Capuchin Father Maria Benedetto. The Convento dei Cappuccini (Capuchin Convent) became the headquarters of the committee and the flow of funding was restored by using the mediation of the ambassadors of Great Britain and the United States of America at the Vatican, in addition to Father Maria Benedetto going twice to Genoa, returning to Rome with large sums of money.
  In the nine months of Nazi occupation, aid worth was "approximately 25,000,000 lira", was distributed and "assisted more than 4,000, including 1,500 foreigners and 2,500 Italians." The Rome DELASEM was also a place to find asylum and distribute false documents.
caption: Father Maria Benedetto
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