On Rabin's murder, one question remains
Dalia Rabin is sincerely perplexed by the doubts and troubling questions she has recently presented in the media. Furthermore, she is not alone here, but is expressing the sentiments of her brother Yuval and her mother, Leah Rabin.
| Only wicked, cynical people would allege that, four years after the assassination, the Rabin family has suddenly produced a list of questions simply because they are hungry for the limelight and for headlines. In the same vein, it is ridiculous to suggest that the Rabins are publicity hounds or that they are furious that the memorial day marking Yitzhak Rabin's murder is becoming a national institution and slowly slipping out of their hands. It therefore must be concluded that MK Dalia Rabin-Pelossof (Center) is sincerely perplexed by the doubts and troubling questions she has recently presented in the media. Furthermore, she is not alone here, but is expressing the sentiments of her brother Yuval and her mother, Leah Rabin. In a country that has known much grief, it is by no means unusual for a bereaved family to express doubts as to whether they have been told all the facts concerning the death of a loved one. This is especially the case when the loved one was a soldier, because the fear that negligence may have been involved and that not all the circumstances surrounding the death were conveyed can eat away at the members of the bereaved family for the rest of their lives. In the case of the bereaved families of fallen Israeli soldiers, there are no commissions of inquiry, no national soul-searching, no thorough examination of our law enforcement system. To a great extent, the Rabins are like any other bereaved Israeli family, which must live, day in and day out, with the thought that the death of their loved one could somehow have been prevented. The question, however, is why are the Rabins raising these questions today, four years after the tragic event? The assassination of the leader of a democratic nation invariably produces speculation. The murder of Swedish Prime Minister Olof Palme in 1986 has yet to be solved. John F. Kennedy was assassinated in 1963 by a sniper who himself was gunned down - before he could be interrogated - by a man with ties to the Mafia, a man who subsequently died in a prison cell. The circumstances of JFK's assassination and its juxtaposition with the murder of his brother Robert, who was attorney general and a presidential candidate, have led to the development of the theory that the Mafia was behind the killing. Although many believe that the truth about JFK's death has still not fully been revealed, the Kennedys have never demanded an investigation in addition to the ones that have already been conducted, have never referred to any perplexing questions and have not called for further commissions of inquiry. The question that must be asked here is: Why is the Rabin family asking these questions and expressing these doubts now - four years after the assassination? Have they learned any new facts that were not presented to the Shamgar Commission? Do they harbor suspicions that we know nothing about? Immediately following the assassination, Leah Rabin accused the right of having incited political murder. Now the Rabins are arguing that certain unexplained events took place on the night of Rabin's assassination. For example, who screamed out "They're blanks, only blanks?" A police officer? A bodyguard? Or, why did the bodyguards not fire any shots at the assassin, Yigal Amir? Why was Ichilov Hospital not notified that a mortally wounded prime minister was on his way to the emergency room, and why did Rabin's driver, Menahem Damati, have to search for a stretcher? Why is there a discrepancy between the hospital report, according to which Rabin was shot twice in the back and a third time in the chest, and the pathologist's report, according to which all three bullets entered the prime minister's back? Why did Dr. Gaby Barabash state at 10 P.M. that Rabin's condition had stabilized and then announced at 11:23 P.M. that he was dead? Why was Leah Rabin taken to Shin Bet headquarters and why was she under the impression, when she spoke with her daughter, that nothing serious had happened? The fact that such questions are being asked now, precisely when Avishai Raviv is about to stand trial, is inadvertently bolstering the case for a conspiracy theory, which claims that the Rabin assassination was planned by "insiders" and which was widely publicized by the right in an attempt to counter the accusations of incitement to political murder. With the passage of time, conspiracy theories assume a life of their own and, like the "revenge of the husband of Palme's lover" and "Kennedy's links with the Mafia," sometimes tend to be remembered in later generations as solid facts. It is regrettable that the Rabins are unintentionally strengthening this ludicrous "argument." Nonetheless, there is one difficult question connected to the Rabin assassination and that has still not been answered: Where are all those rabbis who issued the "pulsa denura" curse, who ruled that Rabin was a traitor and therefore worthy of a death sentence by Jewish law and who therefore in effect conveyed the message that it was permissible to murder him? Where have they vanished to? Why have none of them been arrested and put on trial? Why are they being allowed to continue quietly pursuing their studies, rolling their eyes heavenward as if to say that they cannot be accused of having had any part in the shedding of Rabin's blood? This is the only question connected with the assassination that must still be investigated - so that it can be determined to what extent these rabbis can be held criminally responsible for the murder and so that it can be decided how to initiate legal proceedings against them. After all, murder, no matter how it is committed - whether with quotes from the Bible or with a gun - is not, and must never be, subject to any statute of limitations |
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Published date - 09/11/1999 |
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