We have before had cause to mention antisemitic activity in Argentina’s sun baked, dengue ridden province of Chaco and today we have cause to do so again.

Héctor Gómez is a leader of the MTD Túpac Amaru, a social organization which, like many others in this country, sees itself as being on the left and as fighting for the rights of the dispossessed and marginalized by society. Speaking yesterday to a protest meeting, Gómez said the following:

We see our people dying of hunger while the wealth [of the province] passes them by on the highways, with all of our capital and production being carried off abroad and enriching Jews and foreigners. We should kick out the Jews and foreigners; kick them out of our land.

Well, at least he wasn’t trying to say that he was only being critical of Zionists.

Gómez’s remarks have brought the usual round of weary condemnations from the more respectable figures in the human rights movement and from the Jewish community. As far as I can see, there hasn’t been a word from the CTA national trade union federation, with which  the MTD Túpac Amaru is associated.

There was a particularly interesting response from Luis D’Elía, leader of another social movement, government loyalist and no stranger to regulars at this bar.  He said that it was unjust of Gómez to talk of Argentine land being in the hands of Jews as there were no Jews on his organization’s list of the nation’s biggest landowners.

From this statement we must presume that D’Elía believes  that there would be something wrong about Jews owning lots of land and that he spends his time scanning land registry documents looking for names that sound Jewish.