An Argentinian Holocaust memorial 15 years in the making has been indefinitely delayed, after local and national laws have repeatedly thwarted its construction.
The proposed monument for the Argentine capital, the first of its kind in Latin America was initially delayed at its conception whilst the Buenos Aires city government introduced a new law to approve outdoor monuments and with further bureaucratic complications adding to the equation, the process ground to a halt.
As it currently stands, the project has no expected start or completion date, as Aldo Donzis, president of the Delegation of Argentine Israeli Associations (DAIA), the representative Jewish community umbrella group, confirmed: “We are meeting with the administration of President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner to see when we can set a date. Navigating two legislatures and two governments slowed the process significantly.” Funding for the project remains an additional concern, as despite the Argentine Congress initially backing the idea and launching an international design contest in its honour in 2007, the country’s Ministry of Culture this week backed away from committing to pay for its construction, issuing a statement to the effect that “gathering the funds needed to carry out the commemorative monument is the responsibility of authorities of the Jewish community, in coordination with the Ministry of Culture”, insisting that it was always intended that the monument would be co-funded by “the contributions of institutions and individuals”. The Jewish community in response has grudgingly accepted the government’s offer to partially pay for the project, as Donzis said ‘in the very least, we would please to see the government pay for a part”.
The city has however made plans for the accommodation of the monument, renaming the surrounding area ‘Shoa Plaza’ (Holocaust Square) and planting seven trees representing the branches of a menorah. Mauricio Macri, governor of Buenos Aires, spoke of rising anticipation for its eventual construction: “We’re no longer the only ones interested,” he enthused, “the people and the plaza are waiting for this memorial.”
The walled monument design will be divided into two parts, each symbolising one of two recent attacks in the city: the first will hold 29 stones representing the number of people killed in a 1992 terrorist attack on the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires; the second consisting of 86 for the number of victims killed in the 1994 bombing of the AMIA (the city’s Jewish community centre). Both attacks remain unsolved.
The monument holds particular resonance in Argentina where state terrorism conducted between 1976-1983 led to the disappearance or murder of 30,000 people.
The memorial, though designed to pay tribute to victims of the Holocaust, will be intentionally constructed without any religious symbols so to as pay equal respects to victims of all genocides.
“The monument will be a sign of hope for the city, the country, and the entire world,” Marsiglia predicted.
Argentina earned a reputation for opening its doors to Jewish immigration, which it did so until 1938, when the government instituted new legislation preventing the flow of immigrants at a time of Nazi aggression in Europe. The Jewish community feared the rise to power of nationalist leader Juan Peron in 1946, when Argentina became a safe haven for Nazis seeking refuge from prosecution. Final Solution architect Adolf Eichmann moved to Argentina after the war, where he lived until his capture by Israeli Mossad agents in 1960. After Peron conversely established diplomatic relations with Israel in 1949, huge waves of Argentinian Jews have since emigrated to the Jewish State.
The Jewish population of Argentina currently stands at approximately 250,000, the largest in Latin America, the majority of whom live in the capital.
Speaking at last week’s Presidential Conference in Jerusalem, Mexican Professor Judit Liwerant spoke of the “organised institutional density” of Jewish life in Latin America, which continuously looks to future generations by building new community infrastructure, as well as the mass relocation of Jews from Latin America, which is home to a community of 400,000, to the US and Israel, where a further 400,000 Latin American Jews are based, describing the region as part of a “trans-national Jewish Diaspora”, where Israel continues to play an “essential role in Jewish Latin-American life”.

EJP