Jerusalem – On 23rd Anniversary Of Slain Leader Rabin, Family Blasts Netanyahu

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    Rabin family members lays a flower wreath on the grave of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin's during a memorial service marking 23 years since the assasination, held at Mount Herzl cemetery in Jerusalem on October 21, 2018. Photo by Marc Israel Sellem/POOLJerusalem – Slain prime minister Yitzhak Rabin’s grandchildren blasted Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during services marking the 23rd anniversary of Rabin’s assassination on Sunday, in one case falsely accusing Netanyahu’s spokesperson of a tweet referring Rabin as a traitor.

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    Noa Rotman, speaking at a ceremony at Mount Herzl, harshly criticized the country’s political leadership and said that people in positions of authority were taking part in inctiment

    “If you don’t stop the journey of incitement, blood will be spilled here,” she said, as Netanyahu was sitting in the front row alongside President Reuven Rivlin.

    “Our media should be independent and strong, not just measured in economic profit,” she continued. “The problem is that in our country these days, doubt is treachery, criticism is pettiness, a personal demand is political persecution.”

    “Only recently a Pashkavil, a tweet on Twitter, was published on behalf of the spokesperson in the Prime Minister’s Office, which included a picture of Rabin with Arafat under the title ‘traitor.” Rotman said that none of those in the front distanced them from the tweet. She also said the “spokeswoman” still receives a salary from the PMO.

    Netanyahu cast a quizzical look at Rivlin, who also signaled that he did not know what Rotman was talking about it.

    At the Knesset two hours later, Netanyahu referenced Rotman’s statement, and said he was “astonished” by the accusation, and that it was completely useless. The tweet in question was a retweet by Caroline Glick of a satirical poster before Yom Kippur showing pictures of various left-wing figures and organizations under terms used in the traditional confession Jews say on Yom Kippur.
    Late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin's granddaughter Noa Rotman speaks at a memorial service marking 23 years since the assasination of late Israeli Prime Minsiter Yitzhak Rabin, held at Mount Herzl cemetery in Jerusalem on October 21, 2018. Photo by Marc Israel Sellem/POOL
    Over a picture of Rabin shaking Yasser Arafat’s hands on the White House lawn was the caption, “we sinned.” She later removed the tweet.

    “I was shocked, because I did not believe for a minute that someone in the Prime Minister’s Office did such a thing,” Netanyahu said. “But I immediately asked to look into it – and it turned out that it really did not exist. This is a tweet from a journalist who has nothing to do with the Prime Minister’s Office.”

    He said he knew nothing about the tweet, and distanced himself from it.

    “This is unfortunately an example of how, sometimes, while talking about the moderation of speech and the fight against incitement, things are said that are offensive and baseless, not only about me, but also about an entire public,” he said.

    Earlier in the day, at a ceremony at Beit Hanassi, another Rabin grandson, Yonatan Ben Artzi, in a barely-veiled reference to Netanyahu, said “leadership that encourages division and violent attacks against others, he who incites and pushes to the fence and catalogues anyone who thinks different as ‘sour’ or a ‘leftist,’ continues to divide us and will bring destruction to this house.”

    It’s not customary to applaud at memorial events,but Ben Artzi received applause when he called on Rivlin to use his influence to bring about legislation that will limit the period of time that a prime minister of Israel can serve.

    Ben Artzi, speaking on behalf of the family, reviewed the history of his grandfather with that of the state to illustrate how they were intertwined. Recalling his grandfather as a valiant soldier who triumphed in war but who sought peace, Ben Artzi quoted from Rabin’s address on the occasion of Israel’s 40th anniversary in which he said that the Zionist dream of the return to the homeland had been realized, and there was a desire by people who came from countries such as Russia and Yemen who had never known democracy much less dreamt of it, to create a Jewish and democratic state. Much time had been spent in battle and much blood had been shed, and Rabin had decided that it was time to start a new innovative chapter in the nation’s history. Ben Artzi repeated several times that democracy is inherent in Jewish tradition, and implied that under the present administration democracy is at risk
    President Reuven Rivlin, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and Supreme Court President Esther Hayut, during a memorial service marking 23 years since the assasination of late Israeli Prime Minsiter Yitzhak Rabin, held at Mount Herzl cemetery in Jerusalem on October 21, 2018. Photo by Marc Israel Sellem/POOL
    Rivlin in his address quoted a woman who as a new immigrant to Haifa from Argentina had written a week after the assassination in which she wrote that in the beginning she felt pain, anger, impotence and the inability to comprehend . Everything was black, and the feeling didn’t pass. “I can no longer cry, speak or listen…fear has won the day,” she wrote.

    From the perspective of time, Rivlin said that he had begun to grasp the fear that had engulfed the letter writer. What was that great residue of fear that overtook not only the new immigrant but lingered in the hearts of all Israelis? Rivlin pondered, and reached the conclusion that that it was the fear of ourselves. “It was the first time that we understood how easy it was to destroy all that we, our fathers and brothers had built.”

    Since the assassination said Rivlin, Israel has been through difficult times, through wars and controversial political issues, and yet despite extreme polarization of views, nothing of this horrific magnitude had recurred.

    While conscious that his own generation which had had fought alongside and under the command of Rabin, and had witnessed the native son of Jerusalem become the first sabra prime minister of Israel would never forget or forgive the heinous crime, Rivlin was more concerned about future generations which have not yet been challenged by incitement, hatred and bloodshed “when we cannot agree on what we want to remember.”

    He queried how much of Rabin’s legacy could be relayed via the torch of memory, .

    For people who have annually attend the Ner Yitzhak (Candle for Yitzhak) ceremony at the President’s Residence, this was a question that becomes more worrying from year to year.

    There were so many empty seats that the Master of Ceremonies asked the people sitting in the rear to come forward and fill the vacancies in the front rows. Hardly anyone from Rabin’s government was present, and of the Labor Party members past and present, the one that stood out most was Amir Peretz who embraced each member of the Rabin family including Rabin’s 94 year old sister Rachel who came from her home on Kibbutz Manara in the north of the country as she does each year.


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    lazy-boy
    Active Member
    lazy-boy
    5 years ago

    Rabin was a no good bum; he cared only for his own fame and was ‘mafker’ the lives of many Jews who lived in the West Bank, the Golan and Gaza. They were very worried about the so called peace process in which Rabin did not consider the lives of the Jews in those areas and even called them low names.

    I am not for his killing, but he encouraged it by not caring for them. He was the PM of all Israel and not just the stupid liberal lefties. He should have considered all the Jews and not just himself and his liberal friends.

    Sure his family hates Bibi. Bibi has dealt with the reality of the Arabs and their lies. Rabin accepted the Arab lie as truth.

    triumphinwhitehouse
    triumphinwhitehouse
    5 years ago

    Fake news liberals, good riddance if these atheists rabinites

    5 years ago

    How surreal. The name of our forefathers YITZCHAK on the tombstone of a goy gumir. Unfortunately no Jewish looking person til I found a little boy with a kippa. How sad!

    triumphinwhitehouse
    triumphinwhitehouse
    5 years ago

    Rabin was even weaker than the weak Bibi. good riddance of this Arafat lover.

    PaulinSaudi
    PaulinSaudi
    5 years ago

    Try to make peace and you get killed. Same on both sides.

    5 years ago

    There are rumors that he did teshuva at the end of his life. Careful…

    yosher
    yosher
    5 years ago

    I guess everyone forgot that Rabin SHOT at the swimming survivors of the Altteleina sinking. He had to do it for political goals. Who justified political killing?

    5 years ago

    President Rivlin stated : ‘Since Rabin’s assassination , nothing of this magnitude has recurred….
    Sorry , Mr. President: The expulsion from Gush Katif initiated by Ariel Sharon , was just as disastrous , if not worse… What have we received for this move???? Constant attacks thru rockets , fire kites , stabbings , and murders from our “new” next door neighbors in Gaza!!!!!!
    Many who were ruthlessly driven from their homes and built-up communities , STILL have no permanent dwelling place!!! And what became of the beautiful built-up communities of Gush Katif????? A TOTAL CHURBAN and a shooting range to kill and maim people and properties in the jewish state!!!!!!