In Argentina, ‘Let’s Burn the Jews’

Argentina? The land of the milonga and the epic of the pampas “Martín Fierro” and Carlos Gardel? The name evokes, or provokes, several lines of thought. It used to be said, as a mordant joke, in the 1950s, that someone who had dropped from view was “alive and well and living in Argentina.” This was a reference to the scandalous ability of Nazi war criminals to escape to Argentina on one of the busiest ratlines, aided by other Nazis and by some antisemitic clerics in the Vatican, and set up in their new lives with some of the vast sums, in cash or in valuable paintings, antiques, and jewels, that had been stolen from Jews all over Europe before they were murdered. The most famous of these murderers, who lived quite contentedly, meeting up with his old pals from Nazi Germany, trading stories and slapping their thighs as they considered all the fun they had had in the good old days, was Adolf Eichmann, who lived on Garibaldi Street in Buenos Aires until the Mossad finally caught up with him and took him back to Israel, where he became the only person in Israel sentenced to capital punishment.

Juan Perón actively encouraged Nazis to settle in Argentina, where they would be safe under his benevolent rule. Argentina had been pro-Axis during World War II, and that policy continued after the war. Some Nazis later served in Argentina’s military, including one who became the head of the Argentine Air Force. Perón designed his soldiers’ uniforms to look exactly like those of the SS.

It is interesting that, after Juan Perón and his wife Evita, “la Gran Puta” (“the great whore”) celebrated in some circles for the attributed ministrations of her mouth, the most famous Argentinian of the 20th century was the writer Jorge Luis Borges. Borges was famously philosemitic, sometime wistfully expressing his wish to have had Jewish ancestors. He wrote two poems in 1967, “Israel” and “A Israel,” celebrating Israel’s victory in the Six-Day War. In 1969, he wrote another poem about Israel after having visited the country at the invitation of David Ben-Gurion.

Which brings us back to those idiotic boys shouting “let’s burn the Jews” on their tour bus. More on this incident can be found here: “‘Today, we burn the Jews’: Scandal after Argentinian high schoolers shout antisemitic slogan,” by Mathilda Heller, Jerusalem Post, September 29, 2025:

Argentinian President Javier Milei strongly condemned a video depicting high school students shouting, “Today, we burn the Jews” on a tour bus in Buenos Aires.

The video shows students from the Humanos school in Buenos Aires chanting the antisemitic slogan while on a graduation trip on September 10 organized by a tour operator named Baxtter.

The tour coordinator seemingly joined in the chanting rather than intervening, as did one of the accompanying fathers. The video was first circulated on Sunday by X/Twitter user Dani Lerer, who told La Nación that it was sent to him directly.

Milei retweeted the video, calling it reprehensible.

The school itself condemned the incident in a public statement on Sunday evening, saying it “strongly rejects the actions of the group of students” and the “attitude of the organizing company and the coordinator in charge.”

The school added that it has no ties to the Baxxter organization’s practices or beliefs.

“The chants disseminated do not in any way represent the values of our school, which is based on respect, inclusion, and democratic coexistence.”…

Where did these stupid high school boys pick up the phrase “today we burn the Jews”? Was it shouted at the last pro-Palestinian rally in Buenos Aires? No doubt. Is it an import from the Muslim world, with all those Arabs who now live in Argentina and, especially, those hundreds of thousands of Palestinians who now live next door in Chile? Certainly. Or Is it an expression of the old time antisemitism of right-wing Catholic fascists, like General Jorge Rafael Videla, and other generals in Argentina’s ruling junta that lasted from 1976 to 1983, who systematically killed political opponents, including a disproportionately high number of Jewish people, by throwing them out of planes? These became known as “death flights” (vuelos de la muerte). I wouldn’t be surprised. Or perhaps both antisemitisms — the Islamic and the fascist kinds — contributed to those stupid high school kids thinking it was great fun to be as outrageous as they could be, by gaily chanting “today we burn the Jews.” Even more disturbing, at least one of the fathers on the bus, and the tour coordinator, joined in the chant.

I hope the Argentinian school authorities do not make light of this outrage, and compel these callow compañeros, chanting, in their lunfardo muy cerrado, that intolerable phrase, to watch documentaries on the Holocaust, to read books on antisemitism, even to meet with Holocaust survivors in Argentina, in the possibly not forlorn hope that at least some of them will be stunned into sorrow and repentance.