The fires started quietly. In early January 2026, a plume of smoke rose over the lenga forests and glacial valleys of Argentine Patagonia. By the time the blazes were fully visible from the air, thousands of hectares had been scorched, rural communities were under threat, and officials acknowledged that some of the fires were deliberate, with accelerants and military-grade devices recovered. Firefighters, aided by aerial units and the army, battled against fierce winds and a landscape already stressed by drought. But these fires were more than an environmental crisis. In towns from Bariloche to Lago Escondido, whispers circulated that foreign actors, including known Zionists. might be exploiting the chaos. Indigenous Mapuche communities and local activists began raising concerns about Israeli nationals, sometimes identified as Israeli soldiers, moving into remote lands, their presence coinciding with government reforms easing foreign ownership of burned and rural properties.
What once circulated as a rumour has now become an unavoidable reality on the ground. Across Patagonia — on both the Argentine and Chilean sides, unease is growing as residents and visitors alike confront an increasingly visible and unexplained presence of Israeli nationals, many presenting themselves as ordinary backpackers. Their numbers are not seasonal anomalies but a constant: thousands arrive every year, in every season. In towns like El Calafate or Bariloche, which was a refugee city for Nazis after World War II, the signs are impossible to ignore; Hebrew lettering dominates shop windows, hostels, and travel agencies, creating the uncanny impression of a parallel cultural footprint embedded deep in the Patagonian frontier.
Locals are no longer asking whether something is happening, but why. What explains this sustained presence in one of South America’s most strategic and resource-rich regions? Why now, and why here? As criminal fires devastate vast stretches of land and Argentina’s political leadership deepens its alignment with Israel under the Isaac Accord, the official explanations grow thinner, not clearer. Is Patagonia quietly being repurposed into a geopolitical backyard? Is Argentina becoming a testing ground, or a playground, for foreign strategic interests?
These questions, once dismissed as fringe speculation, are increasingly difficult to ignore. And the deeper one looks, the more the story resists simple answers. (more...)
Related:
The Capitalist Mafia’s Playground: How Milei is Rewriting Argentina for Foreign Profits
The Rise of the Isaac Accords: How Israel is Redrawing South America’s Political Landscape
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