BICOM

A number of memorial ceremonies were held in Israel yesterday to mark the 22nd anniversary of the assassination of Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin in 1995.

Rabin was assassinated on the 4^th of November 1995 after attending a pro-peace really. At the end of the rally he was shot and mortally wounded by Yigal Amir, a Jewish extremist who remains in prison today.

In a ceremony at the President’s residence, Israeli President Reuven Rivlin said the murder “didn’t just eat away at Israeli democracy, but ripped apart its very fabric”. Rivlin said “a democratic society is like a broken vase. Free speech reveals the contradictions, clarifies positions, and tests the ties between the broken parts. We must not be naive, or believe that all will be well. Even if our institutions are in need of change and reform, we must not give up on them or allow them to be undermined”. The official state commemoration was held at Rabin’s grave on Mount Herzl.

The former Prime Minister’s son, Yuval Rabin spoke at the event and said “Rabin and his wife were not handled with kid gloves. Rabin did not enact legislation, did not abdicate his responsibilities and did not whine. Even when he was under an onslaught of the most hateful attacks conceivable, he was everyone’s Prime Minister. That’s not the way things are today”.

Later in the afternoon, the Knesset held a separate commemoration. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu addressed his comments to Yuval and his sister Dalia Rabin by saying that “I greatly appreciated your father and greatly liked him, as well. Over the years, we met many times, and when he presented the Oslo Accords he acted according to what he believed was in Israel’s best interests, and I did and continue to do”.

On Tuesday night hundreds of people participated in a memorial ceremony in Rabin square. The event included speeches and some of Rabin’s favourite songs.