Report Jewish Prisoners in Argentina Detention Camps Are Subjected to Anti-semitism. Torture

Anti-Semitism is rite among the guards of detention comps in Argentina where some 1000 Jews are presently being held, according to a committee of relatives of the victims of Argentinean repression. In addition, the Jewish prisoners are routinely subjected to torture. Members of the committee, who held a press conference here yesterday and asked to remain anonymous out of fear of reprisals against their relatives in Argentina, noted that the fate of the imprisoned Jews remains unclear and that most have disappeared from sight since being taken into official custody.

“The detention camps in Argentina resemble Nazi concentration camps,” observed one committee member. “The Jews are not the only ones tortured there; but they are especially singled out and are forced to listen to anti-Semitic, Nazi songs.”

According to committee members; a Jewish prisoner can be released only under what they termed the most improbable circumstances: if the courts have not received accusations against him for a long period of time, or if his request to leave Argentina is accompanied by another country’s agreement to accept him in that country.

The committee is presently working with Rabbi Morton Rosenthal, director of the Latin American Affairs Department of the Anti-Defamation League of B’nai B’rith. With his cooperation the committee has recently compiled a list containing the names of all the Jewish prisoners and those who have disappeared. The committee urged the Israeli government and the Israel Embassy in Buenos Aires to work actively for the release of the prisoners.