Where is the legal case for the attack on the Israeli embassy?

Thirty-one years after the first attack of international terrorism that took place on Argentine territory, there are no detainees or convictions and the case is still open but there is almost no movement. The attack on the Israeli embassy in Buenos Aires took place on March 17, 1992, around 2:47 p.m., with a toll of 22 dead and more than 350 wounded.

The investigation has always been entrusted to the Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation because this was its original jurisdiction. In 1999, Esteban Canevari of the criminal secretary of the highest court prepared a report with what had been possible to clarify up to that time. The document indicates that in the decision of December 23, 1999, the Court found it proved that the event had been caused by the explosion of a charge of penthrite and trinitrotoluene which had been placed in the rear right part of a van. Ford F. – 100. The vehicle was in the parking lot located in Cerrito between Juncal and Arroyo. A few minutes before the attack, he drove along Calle Arroyo and when he reached the front of the embassy building, he climbed onto the sidewalk with his two right wheels, immediately causing the explosion. The explosion caused the destruction of the diplomatic headquarters and damage to nearby buildings and vehicles that were parked in the area or driving through the area.

The hypothesis of the car bomb was corroborated, among other tests, by a crater in front of the embassy building and the discovery of various parts of the engine which were the subject of expertise which made it possible to locate the number of the motor and thus to individualize it. The highest court, in the aforementioned resolution, attributed responsibility for the attack to the terrorist group Islamic Jihad, the armed wing of Hezbollah.

To reach this conclusion, he took into account various cables from the Argentine Embassy in Lebanon in February 1992 discussing the repercussions of the violent death of Abbas Musawi, then Hezbollah secretary, his wife and his son. Moreover, the terrorist organization itself had claimed responsibility for the attack the day after it in a publication of the Beirut daily An Nahar. This was ratified by Argentine diplomats in Lebanon.

Based on this information, the court found that there was enough evidence to prosecute Imad Mughniyah and therefore issue the international arrest warrant for the purpose of obtaining an investigative statement from him. According to data provided by the US government’s State Department, Germany and SIDE, Mughniyah led Hezbollah’s central and foreign security apparatus and was responsible for Islamic Jihad at the time of the attack. .

The investigation continued and links were established between Hezbollah and individuals carrying out alleged commercial activities in the tri-border area, including Samuel Salman El Reda Reda. It was learned that in 1992, one of his brothers, José Salman El Reda Reda, was arrested and prosecuted by the Federal Court of Rosario after finding in his possession a large amount of counterfeit dollars that would be used to finance terrorist activities. This case was included in the investigation of the Court which issued an arrest warrant against José Salman El Reda Reda.

SIDE later reported that intelligence agencies had informed it that Hussein Mohamad Ibrahim Sulaiman, a Hezbollah operative, had been arrested in Jordan in June 2001. Sulaiman reportedly said that in 1991 he traveled to São Paulo and that at the beginning of 1992, in Foz de Iguazú, he received explosives that he transported to Argentina in a bus hidden in boxes of food, which were then used to blow up the Israeli Embassy.

In addition, based on the statements of the so-called witness “C” in the AMIA case, the Court investigated Jafar Saadat Ahmad Nia, designated as an Iranian diplomat in charge of logistics in the acts of terrorism. The court verified that this subject was accredited as a civil attaché at the Iranian embassy in Brazil between June 8, 1991 and December 28, 1993. According to information from the intelligence services, he entered Argentina on March 16, 1992 and came out on the 18th of the same day. month and year. In December 2006, the international arrest warrants for Imad Mughniyah and José Salman El Reda Reda were renewed. Mugniyah was assassinated on February 12, 2008 during an attack in Damascus by the explosion of a car bomb. This was confirmed by the copy of the death certificate that Interpol sent to the UFI AMIA, which was later provided to the Court’s investigation.

In September 2015, the High Court “decided, with the signatures of Judges Ricardo Lorenzetti, Elena Highton de Nolasco, Carlos Fayt and Juan Carlos Maqueda, to order the international capture of Hussein Mohamad Ibrahim Suleiman and to reiterate the corresponding arrest of José Salman El Réda”. The case is still open, without detainees, without convicts and since the consultation with the judicial page there has been no movement for at least the last six months.