Argentine Jews ponder joblessness at home, or jobs in strife-ridden Israel

Associated Press

Friday April 12, 5:01 AM ET

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina - Mariano, a 34-year-old auto salesman, stood in a Jewish community center with his wife, Raquel, and pondered whether to emigrate to Israel despite the raging Middle East violence.

Although Israeli army incursions and Palestine bombings are worrisome, Mariano, who didn't want to give his last name, said there is little future in Argentina as his country shudders through the fourth year of a devastating economic crisis.

With automotive sales down sharply, he is nearly idled in his job, his income is suffering and he is thinking of starting life anew.

"It's very difficult here. One doesn't know what the future holds in Argentina," said Mariano, who has just met with the visiting mayor of a northern Israeli town who is wooing would-be immigrants.

Observers say as many as 20,000 of the 200,000-strong Jewish community could emigrate to Israel in the next three years, particularly if the economic crisis deepens here and Middle East violence subsides.

For Mariano, who has a 3-year-old daughter, the promise of a better-paying job in a volatile region is preferable to economic insecurity at home where "I don't know what will come next."

As for those who remain, Jewish relief organizations half a world away have pledged dlrs 50 million in humanitarian aid and emigration assistance to help them through bad times.

In a show of support, some 160 Jewish community leaders from across North America visited this week. They included leaders from the United Jewish Communities, an umbrella grouping of North American Jewish organizations that is helping fund numerous programs here.

"We cannot forget that the Argentinean Jewish community, one of the largest in the world, is suffering," said Richard Bernstein, co-chairman of the Argentina task force of the United Jewish Communities.

The crisis has hit hard at a once-thriving Jewish community in recent months as Argentina defaulted on its dlrs 141 billion debt, devalued its currency and saw unemployment crest above 18 percent.

Bernstein noted that Argentina's Jewish community, the sixth-largest in the world, now has an estimated 40,000 members living below or near the poverty line.

Eugene Ribakoff, president of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee that is helping to fund aid programs here, is worried.

"This is a community that was employed. It's a middle class community and unfortunately in an economic crisis like this, the middle class is affected worst and first," Ribakoff said.

On a fact-finding mission that concluded Thursday, the group visited Jewish welfare agencies, food aid centers, schools and programs that local organizations run with help from aid abroad.

At one synagogue in suburban Buenos Aires, a small grocery store offering flour, pasta, cookies and canned foods has been set up for needy families. Similar centers operate throughout Buenos Aires.

Genia Skigin was minding the store as widows and the unemployed lined up. "Every month there are more and more families coming here," she said. "People are losing jobs, it's just terrible."

Luisa Sibar, a widow of nine years, admitted that for her, the food assistance is indispensable: "I need this to get by."

Added another in line, Raquel Nitz, 63: "The problem is there is no work, and no work for anyone over 40 for sure."

That makes emigration enticing.

Pini Kabalo, mayor of Beit Shean, a town of 18,000 people in northern Israel, came to Argentina to meet possible emigres and visit North American Jewish leaders.

He extolled the reasons for moving to Israel, including jobs unavailable in Argentina, as well as extensive assistance once immigrants arrive. He holds out a list of factory jobs and offers of subsidized housing - even free home appliances available through money donated by the Jewish community in Cleveland, Ohio.

"It can be the fulfillment of a dream to come and live in Israel," said Kabalo. As for the violence, he said, "Especially now when the situation is so hard in Israel, we need each and every one of them."

By BILL CORMIER, Associated Press Writer