Every year on the 18th of July, the Jewsih community of Argentina renews its demand for justice for the AMIA bombing that left 85 dead and 300 wounded in 1994 . As has become the norm, a ceremony heldwhere headquarters of the mutual association used to stand.
Marking 29 years since the terrorist attack against the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association, the rally was held at 633 Pasteur Street in downtown Buenos Aires. It started at 9:30 a.m. and 23 minutes later, at 9:53 a.m., a siren was rung at the exact time of the attack.
"Under the slogan 'Absent Justice. Let's Make Our Presence Known', the aim is to continue the ongoing demand [for justice] and fight on behalf of victims and survivors. When justice is slow and inefficient, impunity grows with each passing day, it is inadmissible to live with it, " said Amos Linetzky, head of AMIA.
"The wound grows larger every day and deepens with every day without justice. How much longer can impunity be endured," Linetzky questioned. He referred to the "shameful impunity" surrounding the event "without a single person [deemed] responsible," which causes a "feeling of helplessness and abandonment.”
Regarding the central act of every year, the president of the mutual called on "the entire society to join us, to stand together and make our presence known in the face of a justice system that is absent."
"We will be present again in front of the place that was attempted to be destroyed, to publicly declare that they have not defeated us, and that demanding justice and punishment to the guilty is an ethical imperative we will not renounce.”
Likewise, he requested people's support "so that the massacre against the AMIA does not go unpunished, and so that the relatives of the people who were killed can, to some extent, attenuate part of their pain."
Among the political figures in attendance at the event were three of the leading candidates running for Mayor of Buenos Aires: Martin Lousteau (UCR), Jorge Macri (PRO), and Leanardo Santoro (Unión por la Patria).
Meanwhile, on his Twitter account, Justice Minister Martín Soria, said that "keeping the memory alive and demanding truth and justice again is essential to prevent this type of terrorist attack from happening again."
The Memoria Activa group also called for its traditional act in Plaza Lavalle and claimed that the "govrnment is [also] guilty due to the lack of justice and failure to protect lives."
Nearly three decades after the terrorist attack that left an indelible mark on Argentine society as a whole, there are still no detainees in the case, and the motives behind it have yet to be clarified.
---TIMES/NA/TELAM
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