I have already written here and here about a violent attack on a street celebration in the city of Buenos Aires of the 61st anniversary of the foundation of Israel and later about the petition signed by various pillars of the Argentine human rights movement calling for the attackers to be released forthwith. On Wednesday last there appeared in Pagina /12 a lengthy article by Osvaldo Bayer justifying his support for the petition and today in the same paper there’s a brief reply from Daniel Goldman.

Bayer sets the scene with an account of police violence against workers in Patagonia in the early part of the 20th century. The idea would appear to be to portray the events on the streets of Buenos Aires on May 17th as only the latest in a long series of oppressive acts carried out by the Argentine state against citizens demanding their human rights be respected.  Turning to events at the anniversary celebrations he says that,

Members of the Teresa Rodríguez and MTR movements appeared on the scene with placards and shouting slogans critical of Israeli policy in Palestine and the latest aggression which produced thousands of victims. It’s here where accounts begin to differ. The police say that the protestors attacked those present with punches and clubs and racist, antisemitic slogans. The demonstrators themselves say that while they were chanting slogans critical of Israeli policy against Palestine they were attacked by a group of men speaking Hebrew. Immediately afterwards the Argentine police  detained a number of the protestors accusing them of public order offenses and racial discrimination against the Jewish people.

Later in the piece he says that,

… those arrested say that when they started to shout their thoughts they were attacked by a special Israeli group, in the face of which the police did nothing.

He rounds off his article with the suggestion that Israeli ambassador withdraw the charges against those arrested, implies that more violence will result if he doesn’t and finally says that,

The blame for all this doesn’t lie with a little group of Argentines who went to shout out what they hold to be true and have now been absurdly jailed.

1.

Note the references to “the Argentine police” in an article dealing with events that occurred on the streets of Buenos Aires and published by an Argentine writer in an Argentine national daily. What other nationality would the police be, if not Argentine? Note also the reference to those detained as being Argentine - as opposed to Zimbabwean or Dutch - and to those that he alleges attacked them having spoken Hebrew and forming part of some special Israeli group.

Bayer, self-proclaimed  citizen of the world and saint of the human rights movement in this country  evidently reads what occurred on May 17th as an attack by foreign elements on the body politic of the Argentine nation, a body politic which he evidently believes to  include him, a fluent speaker and writer of German and holder of German as well as Argentine nationality, but doesn’t include any Argentine who speaks Hebrew or felt inclined to show support for Israel on the 61st anniversary of its foundation.

2.

Bayer appears to believe that the investigation into the events of May 17th is being carried out at the behest of the Israeli ambassador and that if he so wished it would come to an end and the detainees would be released.

3.

It’s worth recalling a few facts about what occurred on May 17th and immediately afterwards.  The attack on the celebration led to three people being sufficiently seriously injured to require hospitalization, one of these was a policeman, and among the choicer slogans shouted by the attackers was “Death to the Zionist Jews!” Furthermore, firearms and Molotov cocktails were found in searches ordered by the investigating judge of premises associated with those arrested.

It should also not be forgotten that those detained haven’t been sent to a Zionist gulag. They have been remanded in custody, that’s all. They have legal representation, are appealing their detention and if they can show that the investigating judge has abused his authority they can seek to have him removed from the case.

4.

The events of May 17th, far from being another example of Argentine  state repression of legitimate dissent,  actually represent a modest but welcome break from the past. Cack-handed and half-hearted though it may have been, the state actually tried to protect the right of a group of citizens to express their solidarity and affection with another state, to which they are linked by blood and history, a right the exercise of which is unquestioned for all the other national and religious collectivities in this city and throughout the country.

5.

Rabbi Daniel Goldman replies to Bayer in today’s edition of the same newspaper. He says that members of his own congregation,  present on May 17th , confirmed  to him the violent and unprovoked nature of the assault on the anniversary celebrations, points out that the social concerns which supposedly motivate the groups that carried out the attack don’t give them a monopoly on the truth and voices the suspicion that they get more mileage out of antisemitism disguised as anti-Zionism than the questions of poverty and social injustice which they claim to be the main motor of their  activities. All good stuff.

A pity though, that Goldman feels the need to dress up the core of his response with declarations of affection for Bayer and Adolfo Pérez Esquivel (a Nobel Peace Prize winner who also called for the attackers to be released), self-praise for having spoken out about Israeli government policy and suffering  criticisms from other Jews for having done so. He also describes as “imprudent” the decision to publicly celebrate Israel’s anniversary in the first place.

A pity indeed. Goldman doesn’t realize that no amount of favor currying and protestations about his status as an Acceptable Jew would ever be good enough for the likes of Bayer and that keeping its collective head down and avoiding drawing attention to itself is not a survival strategy that has served Jewish communities well.