Source: JTA
http://www.uja.org/content_display.html?ArticleID=118746
On June 20, 2004 JTA reported, "Rabbi Vittorio Della Rocca was only 11 years old at the time, but he will never forget a historic Shabbat at Rome's Great Synagogue 60 years ago this month. It was June 9, 1944 -- just five days after Allied troops had liberated the city from the Nazis. And on that first Friday night of freedom, an American Jewish chaplain led 4,000 Jews in the Shehecheyanu prayer. 'It was an incredible scene of joy and euphoria,' Della Rocca says. 'There was a black spot, though, as everyone among us started counting to see if they could find all their loved ones.' The Rome temple was the first large synagogue to be liberated in Europe. The American chaplain was Lt. Morris Kertzer, a young rabbi from Iowa City, Iowa. Attached to the U.S. Fifth Army, he had landed with thousands of other U.S. troops at Anzio and witnessed the Allied liberation of Rome on June 4. Kertzer died two decades ago. But this month, almost 60 years to the day after that historic Shabbat service, the Rome Jewish community presented a hand-lettered scroll of appreciation to Kertzer's son, David. A professor at Brown University, David Kertzer has gained renown in recent years for his books on Italian Jewish history."