Argentine President-elect Javier Milley, the controversial ultra-liberal who considers himself very close to Israel and the United States, visited the shrine of an ultra-Orthodox rabbi in New York on Monday, according to what the foundation affiliated with the late Jewish cleric who was a famous and influential figure announced.
The Cool Life Foundation published on its website a video clip in which Milley appeared arriving, amid applause, to a cemetery in Queens, New York, where Ukrainian-born Rabbi Menachem Mendel Schneerson (1902-1994) rests.
Milley wore the Jewish skullcap upon his arrival Monday morning in New York for a private visit away from the media.
Milley, who is considered by the Israeli media to be a very pro-Israel and pro-Jewish person, had announced that he would visit the grave of this rabbi in New York.
The late rabbi is the seventh heir to the founder of the Chabad “Lubavitch” Hasidic movement, one of the most prominent ultra-Orthodox Jewish groups in the world.
Milley had previously visited this grave in July.
Argentina is home to the largest Jewish community in Latin America (250,000 people).
The Jewish community in Argentina is considered among the largest in the world outside Israel, after the United States, France and Britain.
From New York, Milley headed Monday to Washington, where he will meet with US National Security Council Advisor Jake Sullivan, according to what John Kirby, spokesman for this council, announced.
The president-elect will also meet with officials from the US Treasury Department and others from the International Monetary Fund.
Milley won the presidential elections on November 19 and will take office on December 10, succeeding Alberto Fernandez.
Due to an unprecedented decline in the country’s foreign currency reserves, Argentina, the third largest economy in Latin America, is struggling to repay a huge loan worth $44 billion it obtained from the International Monetary Fund in 2018.
