Argentina Top Criminal Court Finds Iran, Hezbollah Responsible for 1992 Embassy Attack

The top criminal court in Argentina, the Federal Criminal Cassation Court, has found that the Islamic fundamentalist organization Hezbollah and the government of Iran, are liable for the deadly attacks on Argentina during the 1990s. These include the deadly attacks on the Israeli Embassy and the AMIA Jewish community center.

The Federal Criminal Cassation Court declared both attacks, the 1992 Israel Embassy attack and the 1994 Argentine Israelite Mutual Association (AMIA) community center attack, as crimes against humanity. This means that this status places both attacks "beyond the statute of limitations despite the passage of time and the lack of judicial results."

It has been over three decades since these attacks and the chamber's judges called Iran a "terrorist state" as it found the country to have ordered both attacks, which were perpetrated by Hezbollah.

However, the Buenos Aires Times noted that the 1994 attack on the AMIA Jewish community center has never been claimed or solved, though both the governments of Argentina and Israel have suspected that Lebanon's Shiite Hezbollah group carried it out at the request of the Iranian government.

"Hezbollah carried out an operation that responded to a political, ideological, and revolutionary design under the mandate of a government, of a State," said Judge d Carlos Mahiques, one of the three judges who ruled on the case. He added that the terrorist group "acted under the inspiration, organization, planning, and financing of state and parastatal bodies subordinate to the Ayatollahs' government."

It is well known that Argentina and Israel have strong ties as the country has the largest Jewish community in Latin America, with over 300,000 Jewish people living there, However, Argentina is also home to immigrant communities from the Middle East, including Syria and Lebanon.

Argentina Court Failed to Provide Concrete Evidence Iran Was Behind Jewish Center Attack

Despite Argentina's top criminal court finding both Hezbollah and its state sponsor, Iran, to be the ones responsible for the deadly attacks, which both happened in Buenos Aires, the Associated Press noted that the court also did not provide concrete evidence that Iran was behind either attack.

There was actually no concrete evidence of Iran's direct involvement presented by the court and neither did it shed new light on the case after 30 years.

It was noted that Argentina has been blaming Iran for the attack for decades now and this placed a strain on the relationship between the two countries.

Victims Could Now Sue Iran Over 1990s Attacks After Court Decision

Even though the Argentine court did not find any solid evidence against Iran, the decision could be pivotal as this opens the Islamic Republic up for lawsuits from the families of those who died in both attacks that have also been blamed on Hezbollah.

"The significance of these grave human rights violations for the international community as a whole invokes a state's duty to provide judicial protection," the 3-judge panel ruled.

Despite this, however, relatives of the victims just found the ruling a "grim reminder of their anguish as the case remains open," according to NBC News.

This article is owned by Latin Post.

Written by: Rick Martin

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