On the same day that hundreds of thousands of people took to the streets to protest the mysterious death of Alberto Nisman, the special prosecutor who spent a decade trying to unravel the 1994 bombing of a Jewish cultural center that left 85 dead, Jacobo Furman was far away from the crowds, lighting a candle for one of the victims of that attack — his son.
Furman said he was sorry for Nisman’s family but that he wouldn’t be attending the rally, even as the country’s most powerful Jewish groups were inviting followers to join in. For better or worse, the prosecutor was one of the reasons that the 21-year-old terrorist attack is still unresolved, he said. And he feared Nisman’s death had been co-opted by the opposition.
“My interest is in solving this case,” said Furman, 75, who visits the site of the bombing once a month with a small group of Argentines who also lost relatives. “Everything else is just politics.”
Argentina is home to Latin America’s largest Jewish population, with anywhere from 180,000 to 250,000 members. Starting with the arrival of eight families in 1888, the community has blossomed. Synagogues and delis punctuate the cityscape of cafés and pastry shops, and Jews are in positions of political prominence, from the cabinet to congress.
While the community has never been monolithic, the events of recent months are bringing divisions to the surface amid orchestrated attempts to divide the population, local leaders said.