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An awkward friendship blossoms between Jerusalem and Asunción

Historian Colin Shindler recounts how Paraguay, a refuge for fleeing Nazis, became Israel's convenient ally in the 1960s

June 8, 2018 09:42
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ByColin Shindler, Colin Shindler

2 min read

When the US moved its embassy to Jerusalem last month, Paraguay was quick to follow suit — much to the delight of the Israeli government.

At an effusive ceremony in Jerusalem, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu thanked the Paraguayan president for taking in Holocaust survivors, while President Rivlin said that Paraguay had been a true friend of Israel ever since 1948. Both leaders were sustaining a morally dubious policy that began after the Six Day War.

In the 1950s and 1960s, Paraguay was under the brutal Alfredo Stroessner dictatorship and had a reputation for harbouring Nazi war criminals.

Josef Mengele, known as the “angel of death” for his role at Auschwitz, applied for Paraguayan citizenship under his real name in 1959 and was granted it without any checks, despite falsely claiming he had already lived in the country for five years. Two prominent Nazi émigrés — Werner Jung and another, known only by his surname von Eckstein — testified to his good character.