The special prosecutor who investigated the 1994 targeted bombing of the Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) Jewish community center in Buenos Aires was murdered in 2015, a new report by the Public Prosecutor’s Office of Argentina has concluded.
On the 10th anniversary of Alberto Nisman’s death, the prosecution handling the case released the report as part of the ongoing and still unresolved trial, reaffirming that Nisman was killed.
“The federal prosecutor Natalio Alberto Nisman was the victim of a homicide,” and “his death was motivated by his work in the AMIA Special Investigation Unit and, specifically, by his actions related to the Memorandum of Understanding with the Islamic Republic of Iran,” the 56-page report says.
Argentine President Javier Milei commemorated the anniversary of Nisman’s death on Saturday, with his office saying in a statement that the prosecutor was killed “at the hands of the darkest forces of power” and reaffirming his “commitment to seek justice for the victims of the AMIA bombing.”
“The executive branch remains confident that the judiciary will continue its investigations so that Prosecutor Nisman’s murder does not go unpunished,” the statement continued.
Milei also called the so-called “memorandum of understanding” between Iran and Argentina, in which both countries agreed to a joint investigation of the 1994 terrorist attack, “a true example of surrender of sovereignty and betrayal of the homeland.”
The 1994 bombing of the AMIA Jewish center in Buenos Aires, in which 85 people were killed and more than 300 wounded, was the deadliest terrorist attack in Argentine history.
In 2006, Nisman formally charged Iran for orchestrating the attack and its Lebanese terrorist proxy Hezbollah for carrying it out. Nine years later, he accused former Argentine President Cristina Fernández de Kirchner of attempting to cover up the crime and block efforts to extradite the suspects behind the AMIA atrocity in return for Iranian oil.
The alleged cover-up was reportedly formalized through the memorandum of understanding signed in 2013 between Kirchner’s government and Iranian authorities, with the stated goal of cooperating to investigate the AMIA bombing.
One day before Nisman was set to appear before the Argentine Congress in January 2015 to present evidence supporting his allegations against Kirchner and several of her colleagues, he was found dead in his apartment, with a gunshot wound to the head and a pistol at his side.
An official investigation into his death initially concluded that the prosecutor took his own life. However, a federal judge later reversed this decision, stating that Nisman’s gunshot wound could not have been self-inflicted.
Investigations are still underway to identify both those who carried out the act and those who ordered it.
Kirchner is set to stand trial for the allegations against her, though there is no set date.
The latest report from the Argentine Public Prosecutor’s Office highlights the role of intelligence agents and the involvement of government officials — including former Security Secretary Sergio Berni, as well as police and military authorities — who contributed to the initial investigation into the AMIA bombing being filled with irregularities and alleged efforts to derail its course.
In April 2024, Argentina’s second-highest court ruled that the 1994 attack in Buenos Aires was “organized, planned, financed, and executed under the direction of the authorities of the Islamic State of Iran, within the framework of Islamic Jihad.” The court also said that the bombing was carried out by Hezbollah terrorists responding to “a political and strategic design” by Iran.
The court additionally ruled that Iran had been responsible for the 1992 truck bombing of the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires, which killed 29 people.
Elena Dina Bumaguin, president of the Israeli Society in Santiago del Estero, said that Nisman’s death is “a link in the entire plot surrounding the case of the AMIA/DAIA bombing.”
“It is an assassination that reflects the ongoing absence of one of the most important pillars of a democracy: justice and security,” she told the Spanish-language newspaper El Nuevo Diario. “The institutional blow highlighted by the prosecutor in his complaint was of immense significance, as it pointed to the highest authorities in the country as being responsible for this crime.”
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