On November 4, 1995, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin took part in a rally called by a coalition of left-wing political parties and peace groups as a response to increasingly strident street protests by the right-wing opponents of the peace agreement.
The 73-year-old leader got to the mic to address more than 100,000 people who had gathered at Kings of Israel Square in front of Tel Aviv’s city hall. Organisers declared it the largest rally in the coastal city in at least a decade.
Rabin said, “I was a military man for 27 years. I fought for 27 years when there was no chance for peace. Today, I believe there are prospects for peace and we must take full advantage of it.” The applause thundered across the city hall.
Before concluding the speech he said, “This rally must send a message to Israeli people and Arabs around the world that Israeli people want peace and support peace.”
Yigal Amir had arrived much earlier to scout the venue where the rally was being held. He lounged around the venue and sometimes sat on a cement planter situated at the bottom of the stairs that officials, participating in the rally, would pass by on their way to their cars. As Amir stood there, Shimon Peres, the Foreign Minister, passed by him, greeting supporters.
Soon, after the rally, Rabin descended the stairway and walked towards his car.
Amir stood just a few feet away. In a flash, he took out his gun from his jacket and extended his arm towards Rabin and shot three times.
The horrified onlookers saw Rabin disappearing under a pile of security men. At the same time, the security officers apprehended the attacker with his weapon immediately and took him under custody.
The three shots proved fatal for Rabin.
One hollow point entered his lower back, ruptured his spleen, then travelled up and to the right, where it punctured his left lung. The other pierced his back below the clavicle, smashed through the rib cage, and entered the right lung. The massive bleeding alone and the collapse of his lungs had made Rabin’s chances of surviving the shooting extremely low.
Meanwhile, Rabin was rushed to the nearby Ichilov Hospital at the Tel Aviv Sourasky Medical Center, where he died on the operating table from blood loss and a punctured lung within 40 minutes.
Rabin’s bureau chief, Eitan Haber, said, outside the gates of the hospital, “The government of Israel announces, in consternation, in great sadness, and in deep sorrow, the death of prime minister and minister of defence Yitzhak Rabin, who was murdered by an assassin tonight in Tel Aviv.”
The autopsy revealed, that a large pocket of air that entered his bloodstream in the lungs had made its way to his brain, restricting the flow of blood and oxygen. The blockage, with every passing moment, eroded the prime minister’s mental capacity. His brain died before his body. Coincidently, in Rabin’s pocket was a blood-stained sheet of paper with the lyrics to the well-known Israeli song ‘Shir LaShalom’ (‘Song for Peace’), which was sung at the rally and dwelt on the impossibility of bringing a dead person back to life and, therefore, the need for peace.
BACKGROUND
On September 13, 1993, Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO) Negotiator Mahmoud Abbas signed a Declaration of Principles on Interim Self-Government Arrangements, commonly referred to as the “Oslo Accord,” at the White House. The agreement was sealed with the historic handshake between Rabin and Yasir Arafat, the leader of the Palestinians. Setting aside a lifetime of enmity, the two leaders agreed on a framework for limited Palestinian self-rule in the occupied territories. Israel accepted the PLO as the representative of the Palestinians, and the PLO renounced terrorism and recognized Israel’s right to exist in peace. Both sides agreed that a Palestinian Authority (PA) would be established and assume governing responsibilities in the West Bank and Gaza Strip over a five-year period. Then, permanent status talks on the issues of borders, refugees, and Jerusalem would be held. Later, in 1994 with Peres and Arafat, Rabin was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for the agreement to end Israeli rule over the Palestinians in the occupied territories. But the peace also provoked a loud and passionate opposition. Settlers and right-wing nationalists held constant demonstrations and protests and jeered Rabin wherever he appeared. They viewed Rabin’s territorial concessions under the Oslo peace accords of the 1990s as a dangerous capitulation and a stab in the back. The killer Yigal Amir was a hardline right-winger. After Rabin’s assassination, when the cops searched his room, near his bed they found ‘Baruch the Man’, a book that praised Baruch Goldstein who had massacred 29 Palestinians as they worshipped in a mosque in Hebron. Amir had strenuously opposed Rabin’s peace initiative, particularly the signing of the Oslo Accords, because he felt that an Israeli withdrawal from the West Bank would deny Jews their “Biblical heritage which they had reclaimed by establishing settlements”. Amir had come to believe that Rabin was a rodef, meaning a “pursuer” who endangered Jewish lives. The concept of din rodef (‘law of the pursuer’) is part of traditional Jewish law. Amir believed he would be justified under din rodef in removing Rabin as a threat to Jews in the territories. “I don’t want people to think I’m crazy. Otherwise, I won’t achieve my goal,” said Yigal Amir to a policeman in one of the waiting rooms during his interrogation. Rabin’s assassination destroyed the possibility of peace between Israel and Palestine. On his 20th anniversary of the assassination, President Bill Clinton said that Rabin would have concluded a permanent accord with the Palestinians. Shimon Peres, Rabin’s perennial rival, said, “I am sure that if he were alive he would have made peace with the Palestinians.”
(Published in The Martyrs' Supplement, The New Indian Express, South India & New Delhi along with The Morning Standard, January 30, 2019
POSTSCRIPT:
Coincidently, in Rabin's pocket was a blood-stained sheet of paper with the lyrics to the well-known Israeli song ‘Shir LaShalom’ (‘Song for Peace’), which was sung at the rally and dwelt on the impossibility of bringing a dead person back to life and, therefore, the need for peace.
Let the sun rise
light up the morning
The purest of prayers
will not bring us back
He whose candle was snuffed out
and was buried in the dust
bitter crying won't wake him up
and won't bring him back
Nobody will bring us back
from a dead and darkened pit
here,
neither the victory cheer
nor songs of praise will help
So just sing a song for peace
don't whisper a prayer
Just sing a song for peace
in a loud shout
Allow the sun to penetrate
through the flowers
don't look back
let go of those departed
Lift your eyes with hope
not through the rifles' sights
sing a song for love
and not for wars
Don't say the day will come
bring on that day -
because it is not a dream -
and in all the city squares
cheer only for peace!
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