PIPERNO BEER, SERGIO

PIPERNO BEER, SERGIO (1906–1976), Italian judge and communal leader. Born in Rome, Piperno Beer took up a juridical career, reaching the rank of a councilor at the Court of Cassation, the highest court of Italy. During the period of racial persecutions (1938ff.), though dismissed from public service, he was active in delasem (Delegation for Assistance to Emigrants) and in the Italian liberal-secular movement Giustizia e Libertà (1943–44). After the liberation he was elected councilor of the Rome Jewish community and chaired the Communal Commission charged to investigate the case of the chief rabbi of Rome, Israel Zoller, who had converted to Christianity.

In June 1956 he was elected president of the Board of Italian Jewish Communities and in this office he worked for the Italian state's recognition of the rights of families who had lost members during Nazi persecutions, for the strengthening of institutions of Italian Jewry and their standing vis-à-vis the State, and for the revival of Jewish culture in Italy. He was active in the contacts with the Vatican before Ecumenical Council Vatican ii and the declaration Nostra aetate. In the aftermath of the Six-Day War (1967) he helped with the emigration of the entire Jewish community of Libya, with the consent of the Italian government. Piperno Beer was reelected as president of the Board of Italian Jewish Communities in 1961, 1966, and 1974.

[Sergio DellaPergola /

Robert Bonfil (2^nd ed.)]