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[Congressional Bills 105th Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
[H. Con. Res. 50 Introduced in House (IH)]

105th CONGRESS
  1st Session
H. CON. RES. 50

   Expressing the sense of the Congress regarding the status of the 
investigation of the bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires in 
                                 1992.

_______________________________________________________________________

                    IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

                             March 13, 1997

  Mr. Lantos (for himself, Mr. Gilman, Mr. Ackerman, Mr. Berman, Mr. 
Deutsch, Mr. Filner, Mr. Frank of Massachusetts, Mr. Frost, Mrs. Lowey, 
 Mr. Rothman, Mr. Schumer, Mr. Sherman, and Mr. Waxman) submitted the 
following concurrent resolution; which was referred to the Committee on 
                        International Relations

_______________________________________________________________________

                         CONCURRENT RESOLUTION

 
   Expressing the sense of the Congress regarding the status of the 
investigation of the bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires in 
                                 1992.

Whereas on March 17, 1992, the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina, a 
        school, and several nearby buildings were destroyed by a powerful 
        suicide car bomb blast in which 29 innocent children, women, and men 
        lost their lives and an additional 252 innocent people were injured;
Whereas the victims of this terrorist attack included employees of the Israeli 
        embassy and their families, children from a nearby Roman Catholic 
        primary school, women and men from a nearby Roman Catholic church 
        shelter, a Roman Catholic priest, and people across the spectrum of 
        Argentine Society;
Whereas Argentina's Jewish community, which numbers 300,000 and is the largest 
        Jewish community in Latin America, has suffered periods of severe anti-
        Semitism during periods of military rule and feels particularly 
        vulnerable to assault from certain radical Islamic groups and from 
        indigenous far right extremists in Argentina;
Whereas Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for the bombing of the Israeli 
        Embassy and praised the name of the alleged suicide bomber, Abu Yasser, 
        by calling him a ``martyr struggler,'' and Islamic Jihad is a terrorist 
        organization that is supported by Iran and United States Department 
        officials have stated that Iranian diplomats collected information to 
        plan the bombing;
Whereas the failure of Argentine and international efforts to bring the 
        perpetrators of the embassy bombing to justice made Argentina a prime 
        target for a second devastating terrorist attack on July 18, 1994, just 
        two years after the bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, when 
        the Asociacion Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA) Jewish Community Center 
        was destroyed in a similar car bombing in which 86 people died and over 
        200 people were injured; and
Whereas the effectiveness of the investigation of the Israeli embassy bombing, 
        which is being conducted by the Supreme Court of Argentina, has been 
        hampered by the inefficiency of having the entire membership of the 
        court in charge of the investigation: Now, therefore, be it
    Resolved by the House of Representatives (the Senate concurring), 
That the Congress--
            (1) notes with regret that March 17, 1997, marked the fifth 
        anniversary of the bombing of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos 
        Aires, that it is now more than two and a half years since the 
        bombing of the AMIA Jewish Community Center, and that police 
        and judicial authorities in Argentina have not yet identified 
        and initiated prosecution of the perpetrators of these two 
        barbarous acts of terrorism;
            (2) urges the Supreme Court of Argentina to designate a 
        single investigative judge to conduct the investigation of the 
        terrorist bombing of the Israeli Embassy in order to improve 
        the efficiency of the inquiry;
            (3) urges Argentinean judicial authorities to move forward 
        aggressively in the investigation of the terrorist bombing of 
        the AMIA Jewish Community Center because of the probability 
        that there is a connection between the bombing and the bombing 
        of the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires;
            (4) urges Argentinean authorities to acknowledge publicly 
        the reports submitted by Argentinian, United States, and 
        Israeli experts, which determined that the explosion at the 
        Israeli Embassy took place outside the walls of the embassy;
            (5) urges the President and appropriate executive agencies 
        to provide all appropriate assistance which has been or which 
        may be requested by Argentinean Government authorities in order 
        to help that Government in investigating these acts of 
        terrorism; and
            (6) directs the Clerk of the House of Representatives to 
        forward a copy of this resolution to the Government of 
        Argentina.
                                 <all>
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