In the “How Far Does Hate Go?” webinar hosted by the Combat Antisemitism Movement (CAM) last month, participants commemorated the 29th anniversary two deadly terrorist attacks targeting Jews in Latin America — the July 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish community center in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and the downing of Alas Chiricanas Flight 901 over Panama.
The webinar speakers included: Daniel Pomerantz, AMIA executive director and survivor of the AMIA bombing; Jennifer Dubin, daughter of Norberto Dubin, who perished in the AMIA attack; and Daniel Shamah, chairman of the Anti-Defamation Commission of B’nai B’rith Panama (CAD), who spoke about Alas Chiricanas Flight 901.
The discussion was moderated by CAM Director of Hispanic Outreach Shay Salamon.
A full recording of the webinar (in Spanish) can be viewed here:
The AMIA Jewish community center bombing — the worst terrorist attack in Latin American history — took place on July 18, 1994. A explosives-laden vehicle was driven into the building in downtown Buenos Aires by a suicide terrorist sent by Iran-backed Hezbollah, killing 85 people and wounding more than 300 others.
No one has yet been brought to justice for this heinous crime. In 2015, Argentine prosecutor Alberto Nisman, who was the AMIA case prosecutor for a decade, was murdered at his home in Buenos Aires, shortly before he was to present his findings about a murky deal that the Argentine government had reached with Iran related to the issue.
The day after the AMIA bombing, all 21 people on board Alas Chiricanas Flight 901, including 12 members of Panama’s Jewish community, were killed when the Panama City-bound Embraer EMB 110 Bandeirante exploded shortly following takeoff from Colón.
While the Alas Chiricanas case has never been officially solved, authorities in Panama, the United States, and Israel consider the bombing to have been an act of terrorism, and the leading theory is that it was also perpetrated by a Hezbollah suicide attacker.
