Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA; ) is a

Jewish Community Centre A Jewish Community Center or a Jewish Community Centre (JCC) is a general recreational, social, and fraternal organization serving the Jewish community in a number of cities. JCCs promote Jewish culture and heritage through holiday celebrations, ...

located in

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires, controlled by the government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Argentina. It is located on the southwest of the Río de la Plata. Buenos Aires is classified as an Alpha− glob ...

Argentina Argentina, officially the Argentine Republic, is a country in the southern half of South America. It covers an area of , making it the List of South American countries by area, second-largest country in South America after Brazil, the fourt ...

. Established as ''Jevrá Kedushá'' in 1894, its mission was conceived to promote the well-being and development of Jewish life in Argentina and to secure the continuity and values of the

Jewish community Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, religion, and community are highly inte ...

. The association established one of Buenos Aires' first

Jewish cemeteries A Jewish cemetery ( ''beit almin'' or ''beit kvarot'') is a cemetery where Jews are buried in keeping with Jewish tradition. Cemeteries are referred to in several different ways in Hebrew, including ''beit kevarot'' (house of sepulcher ...

, and later founded the Tsedaká Foundation for charity. Serving the largest Jewish community in

Latin America Latin America is the cultural region of the Americas where Romance languages are predominantly spoken, primarily Spanish language, Spanish and Portuguese language, Portuguese. Latin America is defined according to cultural identity, not geogr ...

by the 1920s, AMIA inaugurated a new headquarters in

Balvanera Balvanera is a Barrios of Buenos Aires, barrio or neighborhood of Buenos Aires, Argentina. Origin of name and alternative names The official name, Balvanera, is the name of the ''parroquia'' (parish) centered around the church of ''Nuestra Seño ...

, a neighbourhood of Buenos Aires, in 1945; AMIA also became the headquarters of the Federation of Jewish Argentine Communities. It grew to provide and sponsor a variety of formal and informal educational, recreational, and cultural activities, as well as a healthcare cooperative. It became a centre for participation and involvement for people of all ages in Jewish life, and in the community at large. It has an employment agency service that provides connections between employers with potential employees as well as providing training and resources directed to both Jewish and non-Jewish people, with more than 500,000 applicants in its database. The AMIA also maintains the largest

Jewish cemetery A Jewish cemetery ( ''beit almin'' or ''beit kvarot'') is a cemetery where Jews are buried in keeping with Halakha, Jewish tradition. Cemeteries are referred to in several different ways in Hebrew, including ''beit kevarot'' (house of s ...

in Latin America,

La Tablada Israelite Cemetery The La Tablada Israelite Cemetery (), also known simply as the La Tablada Cemetery, is a Jewish cemetery located in the city of La Tablada, in the Greater Buenos Aires conurbation of Argentina. It was established in 1936 and is operated by the Aso ...

, established in 1936.

1994 AMIA bombing

On 18 July 1994 (10th of '' Av'' on the

Hebrew calendar The Hebrew calendar (), also called the Jewish calendar, is a lunisolar calendar used today for Jewish religious observance and as an official calendar of Israel. It determines the dates of Jewish holidays and other rituals, such as '' yahrze ...

), a

Renault Trafic The Renault Trafic (pronounced as "traffic") is a light commercial van produced by the French automaker Renault since 1980. It has also been marketed as the Fiat Talento, the Nissan NV300, the Nissan Primastar and the Mitsubishi Express. Unti ...

loaded with of explosives smashed into the AMIA building and detonated, killing 85 people (67 in the building itself and 18 who were on the sidewalk and in a neighbouring building), and injuring over 300. Following the attack, a series of federal and international investigations were launched; though the case remains unresolved, high-ranking members of the

government of Iran The Government of the Islamic Republic of Iran (), known simply as ''Nezam'' (), is the ruling State (polity), state and current political system in Iran, in power since the Iranian Revolution and fall of the Pahlavi dynasty in 1979. Its Const ...

were indicted, and in 2007, the general assembly of

Interpol The International Criminal Police Organization – INTERPOL (abbreviated as ICPO–INTERPOL), commonly known as Interpol ( , ; stylized in allcaps), is an international organization that facilitates worldwide police cooperation and crime cont ...

issued red notices for five Iranian officials. An centre was later commissioned to replace the destroyed AMIA structure, and in May 1999, the new building, a modernist 8-story structure separated from the street by a protective wall, was inaugurated.

Alternative names

Other

English-language English is a West Germanic language that developed in early medieval England and has since become a English as a lingua franca, global lingua franca. The namesake of the language is the Angles (tribe), Angles, one of the Germanic peoples th ...

names for the organization are: Argentine Jewish Mutual Aid Society, Argentine Israelite Mutual Aid Association (or Argentine Israelite Mutual Association), Argentine Jewish Mutual Aid Association, and Jewish Mutual Association of Argentina.Ben-Dror, Graciela (2008)
''The Catholic Church and the Jews: Argentina, 1933–1945''.

University of Nebraska Press The University of Nebraska Press (UNP) was founded in 1941 and is an academic publisher of scholarly and general-interest books. The press is under the auspices of the University of Nebraska–Lincoln, the main campus of the University of Ne ...

. p. 11. Retrieved January 22, 2015 – via Google Books.

References

External links

*
AMIA Jewish Community in Argentina at Google Cultural Institute
{{DEFAULTSORT:Asociacion Mutual Israelita Argentina Balvanera Buildings and structures in Buenos Aires Jewish Argentine history Jewish organisations based in Argentina Jews and Judaism in Buenos Aires Organizations established in 1894 1894 establishments in Argentina