At Argentina bomb site, deja vu and fading hope for justice

By Brian Winter BUENOS AIRES (Reuters) – Anita Weinstein was on the second floor of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires on July 18, 1994 when the ceiling and walls collapsed from the force of a truck bomb outside. The emotions of that day came rushing back two weeks ago, when her daughter called with news that Alberto Nisman, the prosecutor investigating the bombing at the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA), had been found dead with a bullet to the head in his Buenos Aires apartment. “And then, once that passed, the same fear that we may never know what really happened.” Survivors of the AMIA bombing and many other Argentines are losing hope that either Nisman’s death or the 1994 attack will ever be solved, pointing to their government’s often erratic behavior and a long national history of murky political crimes for which no one gets punished. Many at the AMIA, which has been rebuilt, refer to Nisman as “the 86th death” – a reference to the 85 who died in what has been called the deadliest attack on a Jewish target since World War Two, and Nisman’s own dedication to the cause.