61st Anniversary of Israel Becoming a State

All around the city last week (in the subways and on street signs), the Government of Buenos Aires has been advertising this festival at Plaza de Mayo recognizing the 61st anniversary of Israel becoming a nation. This was rather odd because, even with a huge Jewish population (the largest in South America), the Argentines are not particularly fond of the Jews as indicated by the sayings on a lot of the graffiti throughout the city.

So, my interest was piqued and a friend of mine (a porteno) and I went there after lunch today. A block from the festival (it was more of a small concert rather than a festival) was a guy on the ground with blood gushing from his head. It turns out there were a group of anti-Zionists protesting and he was one of them. Apparently, the protest got violent and 5 people were arrested. When the ambulance arrived, the crowd (mostly Jews) would not let it through to treat the wounded, so they had to find a different route. And, the singer at the time didn't even stop her performance. It was a rather bizarre scene. Click here for a link to the story on clarin.com. The mood was quite tense and not the mood that should have been present as a day of celebration. They even evacuated the Ambassador to Israel, who was scheduled to speak, and brought him to City Hall until the situation was under control.

On a more positive note, once the situation calmed down, they had some excellent tango performances (I don't know the connection tango has to Israel, but hey, it's Argentina!). The photo of me with the two guards is at the entrance to City Hall - across the street from where the festival was. Here's a short video of the tango performance: