‘Jews are the virus’ posters show up in Argentina
National Jewish umbrella body, DAIA, condemns signs in southern city of Neuquen, which has a 0.13% Jewish population
BUENOS AIRES — Anti-Semitic posters blaming Jews for the COVID-19 pandemic appeared over the weekend in the southern Argentine city of Neuquen, nearly 700 miles south of Buenos Aires.
The posters contained phrases such as “The Jews are the virus” and “Argentines Awake to the World Jewish Dictatorship.”
Neuquen has a population of 230,000, some 300 of whom — or 0.13 percent — are Jewish. Argentina has instituted one of the world’s stricter coronavirus lockdowns since March.
“They are criminals, antisocial, who only spread hate in a time when Argentine society is affected by the coronavirus pandemic,” the president of the Jewish organization DAIA’s branch in Neuquen, Carlos Maravankin, told the media. “This does not help our mental health situation and only helps people get sicker.
El presidente de la filial Neuquén de la DAIA, Carlos Maravankin, expresó su preocupación por la aparición de afiches antisemitas en las calles de Neuquén. https://t.co/dDkBsWGmcP
— LMNeuquén (@LMNeuquen) August 22, 2020
Ariel Gelblung, the Simon Wiesenthal Center’s director for Latin America, said “They are spreading a message of hate clearly punishable by law. It is not surprising that it happens in the same location where the extreme right obtained 30,000 votes in the preliminary elections of 2019.”
Last summer, Argentine and international Jewish organizations drew attention to a series of anti-Semitic assaults across the country.