Béla Berend (born Presser; 12 January 1911 – 24 June 1987) was a Hungarian Jewish rabbi and right-wing Zionist leader during the World War II and the Holocaust.

As a controversial member of the Jewish Council of Budapest (or Judenrat), he was accused of collaboration with Nazi Germany during a Communist show trial following the war, but he was acquitted.

Returning Hungary, he continued his studies in rabbinical seminary and simultaneously also attended the department of philosophy at the Royal Hungarian Pázmány Péter University.

[3] In his biography, Berend claimed that he had many difficulties in this position because he, a poor Zionist, was confronted with a community of rich assimilants, who were loyal to the right-wing rule of Regent Miklós Horthy.

[5] József Katona, the rabbi of Dohány Street Synagogue testified during the trial that Berend was a "hard-working, talented, [but] almost careerist person who is too agitated".

However, contemporary documents (bills, accounting) do not support this, the local elite donated substantial sums to the religious community to buy food and clothing for the workers.

[3] In that year, he sent a complaint to the Ministry of Defence in which he spoke against the alleged preferential treatment of the rich converted Jews within the labour service system.

[2] In this capacity, he contacted with far-right and anti-Semitic figures such Domonkos Festetics, the Member of Parliament for Szigetvár, and Zoltán Bosnyák, director of the Jewish Question Institute.

Days after the invasion, Berend sent numerous letters to Bosnyák and Secretary of State for Interior László Endre, a leading figure of the deportations, in which he propagated the emigration of Jews to Palestine.

[8] In his letters, dated in April and May 1944, Berend claimed that he intended to create a Jewish council whose operation would be legitimized by the Hungarian authorities and not under the control of the Gestapo, in the form in which it was established the day after the invasion, under the leadership of Samu Stern.

[10] Berend explained the continuous contact with the perpetrators of the Holocaust with that "it is clear that in times of trials, those concerned about the lives of our people must find a way to those exercising power.

In his memoir, Stern described Berend as the "confidant of László Endre and Zoltán Bosnyák", who also maintained good relations with representatives of the Gestapo and secret police.

[16] According to Braham, Berend aimed to represent the poorer and "little unprotected" Jewish strata within the central council, against the leading triumvirate of Samu Stern and his two colleagues, Károly Wilhelm and Ernő Pető.

Through him, Berend had an entry permit to the Ministry of the Interior, where he negotiated with department heads Albert Takáts and Zsigmond Székely-Molnár, subordinates to Endre.

[19] However, due to his relationship with Bosnyák and the other officials, Berend managed to acquire special permits for the other members of the council to visit the Ministry of the Interior during the course of their rescue efforts.

Through Bosnyák, Béla Berend liaised László Ferenczy with members of the council in order to implement the plan, the so-called Koszorús campaign.

[24] During their trial, Ferenczy and his deputy Leó László Lulay recalled that Berend collected anti-German materials and sent a copy of the Auschwitz Protocols to the regent through them.

[25] Throughout August and September, a mock plan was drawn up by Ferenczy, with the cooperation of the Jewish council, that the Jews of Budapest are gathered in internment camps beyond the city limits.

Berend claimed the purpose of these conversions is only to rescue assets, and "Christian churches become asset-saving asylums, because of the many frightened Israelites, who are running away from standing, struggling with inhibitions, refusing their blood".

Under his guidance, the Zionists established an document forgery plant there in order to declare many Jews as non-Jews by the Arrow Cross Party authorities so they could live outside the ghetto.

In this capacity, Berend maintained contact with József Sarlósi, head of the party's infamous headquarters (the "House of Vengeance") at Szent István Boulevard.

Berend exercised supervisory authority over the board, according to the surviving documents, he also gave instructions to its leaders Miklós Szirt then Ernő Szalkai.

[34] Shortly after the Red Army liberated the ghetto on 17 January 1945, Berend left Budapest and moved to Sátoraljaújhely to the surviving relatives of his second wife, Ilona Windt.

[35] Under violent interrogations and tortures in the headquarters of the Budapest Department of State Political Police (PRO) in May–June 1945, Berend testified that he gave the property of the deported Jews of Szigetvár to the gendarmes, reported the activities of the other members of the Jewish Council of Budapest to the Nazi authorities, raped numerous women during the German occupation and kept Jewish property seized himself.

[8] Simultaneously with the interrogations, the pro-Communist newspapers (e.g. Magyar Nemzet, Reggel, Szabad Szó, Ludas Matyi) launched a series of disparaging campaigns against Berend, calling him a "Nazi-puppet rabbi" and the "informant of the Gestapo".

According to the indictment, Berend was an informant of the gendarmes, the Arrow Cross Party and the Gestapo regarding the whereabouts of the Jewish wealth and also took part in a raid to the International Ghetto (Pozsonyi út) in January 1945.

He argued that he supported Zionism and thus the migration of Jews to Palestine, because this would have saved the lives of a significant part of the Jewry, and in this matter he tried to influence the anti-Semitic politicians.

[44] Contrary to his earlier Zionist views, Berend also worked as a librarian at the Reform Jewish and anti-Zionist American Council for Judaism (ACJ) from 1956 to 1959, but he was also affiliated with the New York Board of Rabbis at the same time.

As a result, Berend sent a complaint letter to deputy prosecutor Gabriel Bach demanding that his name be removed from the case file and referred to "Baron" Freudiger's alleged "friendship" with Dieter Wisliceny.

The court rejected the lawsuit at first and second instance, because although Berend was acquitted by the People's Tribunal, "in the given situation, he deserved disapproval from a social or religious point of view".