VATICAN CITY – Pope Benedict XVI did not intend a "hostile act" towards Jews by placing wartime pontiff Pius XII -- accused of inaction over the Holocaust -- closer to sainthood, the Vatican said Wednesday.

Pius XII's new title of "venerable," decreed at the weekend, "should not in any way be read as a hostile act against the Jewish people," said Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi.

The honour, a necessary step towards beatification and eventual sainthood reflects the late pontiff's piety and not his "historical importance," Lombardi said in a note to the Vatican press corps.

The announcement Saturday drew howls of protest from prominent Jewish leaders including the founder of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, who said elevating Pius XII to sainthood would be "a great distortion of history."

The Catholic Church argues that Pius XII, who was pope from 1939 to 1958, saved many Jews who were hidden away in religious institutions, and that his silence during the Holocaust was born out of a wish to avoid aggravating their situation.

The timing of the move raised eyebrows in Rome, where the 82-year-old German pope plans a high-profile visit to the Italian capital's main synagogue on January 17, his first as pontiff.

The Holy See hopes the visit will be an "occasion to reaffirm and consolidate... the ties of friendship and esteem" between the Roman Catholic Church and the Jewish community, Lombardi's statement said.

Benedict on Saturday simultaneously bestowed the "venerable" title on his charismatic immediate predecessor John Paul II, a move Vatican watcher John Allen saw as "a kind of strategy of taking the sting out of it."

Lombardi said Wednesday that the move did not signal a "twinning" of the two sainthood dossiers.

"So there is no reason to hypothesise" that the two will be beatified at the same time, he said.

The Grand Rabbi of Rome, Riccardo Di Segni, praised what he called a "timely calming signal" from the Vatican.

"I appreciate the timeliness and attentiveness of the Vatican" in responding to Jewish concerns over the dossier, he said in a statement.

Lombardi's unusual "note" responded precisely to two demands of Rome's Jewish community to keep the synagogue visit on track, said Vatican watcher Marco Politi.

One was to clarify the religious rather than historic justification for the "venerable" title, and the other was to dispel suggestions that Pius XII and John Paul II would be beatified together.

Both popes have the necessary recognised miracle for beatification; a second miracle is needed for sainthood, except in the case of martyrs.

January 17, a traditional day of Judeo-Christian reflection, fell this year during a low point in relations, and Italian rabbis decided to boycott observances.

Many Jews were upset by Benedict's decision to rehabilitate the Latin version of the Catholic Church's Good Friday mass, which contains a prayer for the conversion of the Jews.

Strains deepened further later in January when the pope lifted the ex-communication of a Holocaust-denying bishop.

The issue of Pius XII's sainthood dossier has long put the Vatican at odds with Israel, with which it has enjoyed diplomatic ties only since 1993.

Relations have since improved with a series of fence-mending statements and gestures by the Vatican and the pontiff, notably Benedict's trip to Israel in May during which he prayed at Jerusalem's Western Wall, also known as the Wailing Wall.

The pope also visited New York's Park East synagogue during his trip to the United States in April.