BUENOS AIRES – More than 7,000 miles away from the war-torn Middle East, Argentina’s Jews and Muslims have lived in peace and harmony.
They are the largest Muslim and Jewish communities in Latin America. Muslims are mostly descendants from Syrian and Lebanese origin. They immigrated to the South America country in the 1850s.
Jews – about 75% of them are Ashkenazis– mainly came from Spain following their expulsion in the 1880s. There was a second wave of Jewish immigration in the mid-19th century, especially France.
The attack on the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires in 1992 and the bombing of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association in 1994 – both attributed to Islamic organizations linked to Iran – are exceptionally violent events in a country that values tolerance and multiculturalism.
Emblematic of the cohesion between all faiths, the Argentina pope Francis brought together the religious leaders of the two communities, Rabbi Abraham Skorka and Omar Abboud, who hugged each other in front of the Western Wall in Jerusalem in May 2014.
This photo story was published in the magazine Papers of Dialogue in December 2014 (page 36). Click here.
