David Kertzer is the author of The Popes Against the Jews: The Vatican's Role in the Rise of Modern Anti-Semitism (Knopf). In the book he focuses on the time period from Napoleon to Hitler, and how "traditional" Catholic forms of dealing with Jews became transformed into modern anti-Semitism. Kertzer is Paul Dupee, Jr. University Professor of Social Science and a professor of anthropology and Italian Studies at Brown University. He's also the author of The Kidnapping of Edgardo Mortara about a 6-year-old Jewish boy in Italy who in 1858 was taken from his family, secretly baptized, and sent to live in a Catholic household.

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