TRAGEDY COMPOUNDED (Continued from p.3) office. These results were largely based on the lack of national support for continuing the negotiations with the PLO or surrendering the Golan Heights to Syria. When Israelis read that thousands of "Palestinians," especially minority Christians, were seeking Israeli citizenship papers or that the PLO refused to hand over terrorist murderers living in Gaza and Jericho, they knew something was dangerously wrong. In addition, all Israelis know something of the less heroic details of Rabin's career, recently published in a book in Israel, but not recounted in the popular mythology. For example, the nation watched in dismay as Rabin blindly pursued the flawed Oslo accords despite the In the parallel march to affix blame for Yitzhak Rabin's murder on the rightwing and shore up support for the "peace process," his life has been reinvented. public disagreement of some of Israel's senior political and intelligence figures, including President Ezer Weizmann. Those intelligence figures who voiced reservations were either muzzled, forced to resign, or in some cases derided in the national press by Rabin himself. It was understood in military circles that political reliability and not warfighting skill was the key requirement for advancing to the most senior ranks. Israelis also know of President Weizmann's charges that Rabin had suffered breakdowns at least twice during his long military career: once, as a young commander who abandoned his post and his men while under fire in the 1948 War of Independence, and the second time during the crisis period prior to the 1967 Six Day War when he was the Chief of Staff. Prior to these breakdowns, Rabin had participated in the artillery bombardment of a refugee ship (after the refugees disembarked, but while the crew was still on board) that held ammunition and supporters of the rival rightwing underground group headed by Menachem Begin. A number of Begin's Jewish warriors, intent on fighting invading Arabs, not fellow-Jews, were killed. The nation also had reason to question his political judgment and his Zionism, the ideal of selfless devotion to building the land of Israel and the supposed driving force behind this native-born wunderkind. The best example of the former was Rabin's humiliating resignation from the prime ministership in 1977 because he kept an illegal bank account, in his wife's name, in the United States, reportedly to fund her New York shopping sprees. Finally, Rabin's Zionism is an open question

despite retrospective photo montages broadcast on television showing him with founding Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion, a Zionist beyond question, who believed in the need to occupy as much of Biblical Israel as possible. Rabin also is shown as a crusading military leader and Nobel Prize winner--the message is clear, his life was spent serving the Zionist cause. Yet, since gaining office in 1992, he had all but surrendered the very heart and soul of Zionist aspirations, the "occupied territories" that hold the tombs of patriarchs and matriarchs, secure the eastern approaches to the state and shelter the offspring of the first settlers nurtured by Rabin and Peres in the 1970s. Rabin obviously felt insecure about abandoning the essence of Zionism and the ideals of Israel's founders. Thus, it was for this reason that the Prime Minister constantly found himself at peace rallies and the south lawn of the White House. To complement these public displays of support for continuing the process, Rabin often would vilify his most vociferous opponents, the Jewish residents of Judea, Samaria and Gaza. These vocal demonstrators, who teeter on the brink of disenfranchisement and economic disaster, also were the consistent target of police brutality broadcast nightly on Israeli television. In addition, opposition radio broadcasters were temporarily shut down and Rabin's own cabinet ministers regularly berated the "settlers" for believing that the Bible bestowed any legitimacy in support of their cause. One prominent Laborite even defamed King David in the course of a parliamentary debate. In the parallel march to affix blame for Yitzhak Rabin's murder on the rightwing and shore up support for the "peace process," his life has been reinvented. None of his frailties, shortcomings and open failures are revisited; rather, he is lionized as a political leader of great popularity, tireless effort, and far reaching perception. Those who opposed him, the politicians that make up half the parliament and the voters who put them there, are tarred as evil, beyond the pale. This is what passes for a period of national introspection as called for by the left. This is also why Rabin and his vision were doomed from the start: he was a sadly flawed man engaged in an even more flawed political process in which even the most reasonable objections put forth by his opponents were cast aside. As the ugly shock of Rabin's murder wears off, perhaps a few Israelis will reflect on the hard realities of his legacy and conclude that no good can come from revising history or persecuting one's brother to achieve dangerous political goals. With a little luck, a few more might realize where that path already has led them. David A. Silverstein is a commentator on Middle East Affairs.

Outpost               - 4 -               December 1995