BUENOS AIRES (JTA) – Since March 20, Argentina has imposed one of the strictest COVID-19 quarantines in the world, and its capital, home to the maximum of the country’s Jewish community, will soon reopen.
Jewish schools and synagogues have been closed for five months, but most of the city’s advertising and advertising activities have also been closed. This has led to a local economic crisis affecting most of the city’s business, Jews or non-Jews. The first part of 2020 showed an inflation rate of around 20% and now the peso, the local currency, is losing value: in January, it took 63 pesos to buy a dollar; now exceeds 120 pesos.
Despite the closure, the virus continues to advance in Argentina. The Department of National Health reported a new record of deaths in a day of 283 on August 19. Since the onset of the pandemic, nearly 312,000 more people have become inflamed with COVID-19, with 6,330 deaths.
Frustration boiled in the Jewish network: at the beginning of the crisis, in March, members of an Orthodox congregation were arrested for a mikva, or ritual bath, and later, brides were arrested at their own wedding for convening such a giant meeting. . An Orthodox rabbi said Tuesday that “Judaism in Argentina has reached a low point.”
For the first time in history, busy occasions commemorating the fatal attacks on the Israeli Embassy and AMIA Jewish Center in the city in the 1990s were broadcast online.
But there were also positive points, such as an agreement between the Orthodox network and the government on how to keep rituals safe, and an operation that led nearly a hundred Israeli rabbis to certify a backing point of thousands of tons of kosher meat.
That’s how some local Jewish establishments are doing as the pandemic continues.
Synagogues can slowly reopen
Many have called on the government to restart some recreational and economic activities, and since July 18, the city has had some slow reopenings. Synagogues can be opened for 10 members at a time, provided the mask is used and the fitness protocol is followed.
But despite the new measures, many temples will remain closed to the public and will continue to be offered online for fear of the continued spread of the virus. Lately it’s winter in this South American country.
Major conservative synagogues such as NCI Emanuel, Bet El, Bet Hillel and Amijai will close.
“Government and society are in favor of some normalization, but the dangers still exist,” said Ariel Stofenmacher, 57, rector of the Latin American conservative rabbinical seminar.
“Flexibility is driven by economic needs, others have had enough. But we are still in the middle of winter and without a vaccine, I would probably not call other people to join,” added Alejandro Avruj, 50, rabbi of Amijai, who has published Kabbalat Shabbat with prominent musicians.
The Orthodox movement Habad Lubavitch has opened its establishments with mandatory fitness protocols. “We will open our temples to 10 other people with strict disinfection measures and all the needs of government regulations for our other people,” said 66-year-old Tzvi Grunblatt, general manager of Chabad’s bankruptcy in Argentina.
A thriving deli kosher
The kosher food here, which combines flavors of Sephardic and Ashkenazi immigrants with the classic Argentinian meat, has a charm for Jewish tourists.
The local kosher food market costs around $25 million a year, according to data provided across the city. The city has hosted a kosher festival since 2013, and 11 hotels in the city have kosher certification with workers trained for the kosher tourist.
Restaurants have been closed since March 20 and many are suffering, although some have strangely discovered an opportunity to grow. The Leandro brothers, 42, and Esteban Olsztajn, 44, opened a kosher gourmet food shop 3 years ago in the center of Buenos Aires’ “El Once” Orthodox district, right between the Toratenu Orthodox School and the Maccabi Jewish Community Center.
The “Oh brothers,” as they are called, intended to recreate some of the atmosphere of a Manhattan Jewish grocery store instead of eating that bears its nickname; however, they sell all kinds of Jewish dishes, kosher sushi and other fusion dishes. After expanding their pandemic delivery service, they tripled their sales.
When Stephen was asked why he thought this had happened, he said, “Me in God, didn’t he?”
Esteban is orthodox, but his brother and spouse is not. He presented an explanation.
“After closing, we received orders from all corners of the city, not just our nearby neighbors,” Leandro told JTA.
A hospital that has JCC
The Jewish Community Center of Buenos Aires, called Sociedad Hebraica Argentina, is one of the largest Jewish centers in the city, home to youth sports leagues, classes, professional courses, adult systems and more. We had to put it all online temporarily, but it figured out how to be useful.
Part of its 420-acre outdoor site in Pilar, a city of 300,000 people outside Buenos Aires, has become a transit hospital. The municipality of Pilar ran the site, which had 230 beds for patients with COVID-19. And that’s just one example.
According to the Argentine Jewish umbrella organization DAIA, all its 140 establishments across the country have presented their comforts and volunteers to national and local governments to deal with the crisis. They did so as they went through their own economic crisis, because members were more difficult to pay their dues.
Like Hebraica, another well-known medium of the Jewish network is Hacoaj, a sports and cultural club with about 7,500 members in Tigre, a city in the northern province of Buenos Aires (in addition to the city of Buenos Aires, which is the capital of the country, there is also a province of the same name). Hacoaj has diversified a variety of “home” activities and reduced subscriptions by 20%. Some members donated their discounts to other members in need.
The Kosher Nostra
Buenos Aires is home to some 159,000 Jews, according to 2018 of the world Jewish population through the expert Sergio Della Pergola, which gives Argentina the largest Jewish population in Latin America.
Local Jewish entrepreneurs, artists, professionals and creatives have been greatly affected by the overall slowdown and strict bans on social gatherings and events.
Cancellations of occasions and performances included the 72nd Independence Day of Israel birthday party, organized through the Argentine Zionist Organization. The biggest charm was for the local klezmer organization “La Kosher Nostra”, a band so small in 2011 but now playing for thousands of enthusiasts in stadiums across the country. In 2016, the band performed two performances in front of a crowd of 10,000 in South Africa.
“To honor Israel, we recorded a video featuring more than 60 Argentine artists,” Jonathan Strugo, 27, one of the group’s creators, told the Jewish Telegraph Agency.
The crisis
Every week, principals of the city’s largest Jewish schools, such as Scholem Aleijem, ORT, Martin Buber, Taryet, Beth, among others, hold Zoom meetings to discuss the situation. Most of them have reduced their costs, but the currency crisis is not easier.
Prior to the pandemic, the Jewish organization AMIA responded to about 40 new requests for financial assistance per month. Since quarantine, this figure has increased to more than 500 by month (an increase of 1,200%).
THE AMIA that coordinates activities with communities across the country, called Vaad Hakeilot, has introduced a platform that allows others to donate to other Jewish institutions.
A special segment on education attracted the attention of major media outlets and raised $400,000.
“The call for help has tripled,” 66-year-old economist Miguel Kiguel, president of the Tzedak Foundation, a charity NGO, said in a recent interview. “There are many cases of other people who have jobs, who have a social life, but since closing, all those basic structures have to collapse.
Tzedaku implemented an emergency program called Guesher (“bridge” in Hebrew) for Jewish families in Buenos Aires with a transitional economic assistance program to meet their fundamental needs, such as food, fitness and shelter, for up to six months.
Cinema and crash into a wall
Jonas Papier, 50, directs Motivarte and runs one of the most awarded photography schools in the world. He has 2,000 academics and has won a record seven nominations for the World Photography Organization’s Student Focus Award. A motivarte student won the 2017 edition.
They entered into coaching agreements with Betzalel, Israel’s leading Academy of Arts and Design, and Paper visited Israel several times to teach. In 2019, he took to the streets of Tel Aviv to give his outstanding home course on street photography, in Spanish, Hebrew and English.
He had planned a 2020 edition in Tel Aviv with new projects to involve Israeli institutions.
“We miss Israel. The construction of the school is empty. Now I’m too busy transforming the whole concept of the school into a virtual platform,” Paper said. “The good news is that we are recovering our technical staff with professionals who have taught here in the afterlife and now live in Europe and Israel.”
For more than 16 years, the Buenos Aires Jewish Film Festival has released 250 films through Israelis such as Yosef Shiloaj, Dan Wolman, Ayelet Bargur, Igaal Niddam, Ilan Heitne, David Volach and Jorge Gurvich, and Americans Ann Coppel, Hilary HelsteinArray Adam Vardy. , Gaylen Ross and Adam Zucker.
The festival’s creator, Luis Gutman, 73, told JTA that the devaluation of the peso made it difficult for him to buy the rights to the films to be exhibited at the festival. For 16 years, the festival screened films at Cinemark film station for two weeks in November.
“Cinemark still makes sure that cinemas will reopen this year and I’m not successful in buying the rights to the films and displaying them online; so if the film industry remains closed, I don’t think there will be a festival this year and it will resume operations in 2021,” he said.
However, one is safe.
“[P] or I’m sure it probably isn’t an online festival,” Gutman said.
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