Latin America’s largest online retailer is removing anti-Semitic objects from its site

By JTA Staff February 25, 2021

BUENOS AIRES, Argentina (JTA) — Mercado Libre, Latin America’s largest online retailer, is purging anti-Semitic objects it previously listed for sale from its store.

The company is removing books such as “Mein Kampf” and “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” in addition to other Nazi coins, posters and memorabilia.

On Feb. 11, the retailer publicized an agreement it signed with a regional branch of the World Jewish Congress to work to fight anti-Semitism. As part of a joint strategy, both organizations will work to identify other publications on the platform that incite racial hatred speeches.

“From our social role in the 18 countries of the region where we operate, we trust that we have taken another step towards the eradication of racial hatred and anti-Semitism,” said Jacobo Cohen Imach, Mercado Libre’s senior vice president of legal and government relations.

Founded in 1999 by Argentine Marcos Galperin, Mercado Libre operates in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, the Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Guatemala, Honduras, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Salvador, Uruguay and Venezuela. The agreement with the WJC affects the operations in all these markets, where it is more popular than fellow e-commerce giant Amazon.

“Working for coexistence and against hate speech is the responsibility of the entire society. Alliances like this one between civil society organizations and technology companies are of great value in this regard,” said Ariel Seidler, program director for the Latin American Jewish Congress and the head of the Web Observatory, a program previously launched by the Congress to remove anti-Semitism from Spanish-language websites.

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