The Eichmann Kidnapping: Its Effects on Argentine-Israeli Relations and the Local Jewish Community

Abstract

T he election of Arturo Frondizi as president of Argentina in February 1958 was welcome news to both Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires and leaders of local Jewish community. And he had not lived in presidential palace for long before their expectations appeared to have been justified. The Jews of Argentina felt a growing sense of security and well-being, and relations between Jerusalem and Buenos Aires grew closer.1 The kidnapping of Adolf Eichmann in May 1960, however, interrupted this idyll, precipitating a crisis that nearly severed ties between two countries and threatened ArgentineJews' sense of personal security. The Argentine Jewish community, which was then just marking hundredth anniversary of its existence, became target of a wave of antisemitic terror and nationalist attacks that sought to cast doubt on Jewish citizens' loyalty to Argentine republic. This article will examine consequences of Eichmann kidnapping for Jewish community of Argentina and for Buenos Aires' relations with Jerusalem. The contrast between very speedy resolution of crisis in Israeli-Argentine relations and affair's long-lasting effects on Argentina's Jews indicates once again that interests of local Jewish community and those of state of Israel-which defined itself on day of its birth as the Jewish state-are not completely congruent and involve, at times, different dynamics.2 It also