Argentine Jewish Community Begins an Investigation of Anti-semitism

Argentina’s representative Jewish body has embarked on an investigation of anti-Semitism here over a key 20-year period preceding and after World War II.

The DAIA, the Delegation of Jewish Associations of Argentina, announced a project called Testimony that seeks to trace the phenomenon from 1930 through 1950.

“We are not trying to hunt Nazis down or to follow their trails because, among other things, there is little left to do in that sense,” said DAIA President Ruben Beraja.

“Our intention is to prepare a report that will reflect those years of polemics, discrimination and persecution. The dossier should help understand Argentine politics and policy during that hard period,” he said.

The investigation has in fact already begun, under the supervision of the DAIA’s Center for Social Studies. The center set up a committee of prominent professionals, Jews and non-Jews, to serve as consultants on the project.

It was conceived after the government raised high hopes by opening files on Nazis in Argentina — which turned out to yield meager amounts of useful information.

But “this is not our reply to the opening of the files by the Argentine authorities,” Mauricio Tenenbaum, an official of the Center for Social Studies, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

“We owe our country this,” he said. “We think this time we are going to get to the bottom of those terrible years, which started in the ’20s with the activities of local Nazi groups.”

According to the DAIA, the investigators will look into public and private files, national and international, and will interview victims or witnesses of anti-Semitism.

Although it is primarily a scholarly endeavor, the project could have political implications if it answers questions left unresolved by the opening of the official Nazi archives.