El Al Resumes Argentina Service — 57 Years After Eichmann Flight

BUENOS AIRES (JTA) — The Argentinean and Israeli national air carriers signed an agreement to begin flights between Buenos Aires and Tel Aviv.

Aerolineas Argentinas President Mario Dell’Acqua and an El Al vice president met on Friday at the Argentinean embassy in Tel Aviv to sign the final agreement between the two national airlines.

El Al and Aerolíneas Argentinas flights will begin next month. Currently a visit of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Argentina in September as part of a visit to Latin American countries is in the planning stages and, if confirmed, Netanyahu will announce the first flight during the visit. The visit, tentatively scheduled for September 12 and 13, would be the first visit of a sitting Israeli prime minister to Argentina and Latin America.

On May 20, 1960, after nine days in captivity in Buenos Aires, Nazi war criminal Adolf Eichmann was brought onto the El Al plane that had landed in Buenos Aires the day before carrying the diplomatic delegation from Israel. The Holocaust mastermind was dressed in the uniform of an El Al crew member.