Rabin Turns in His Grave

Posted on Nov 19, 2009

White House (Archive) / Vince Musi

Uri Avnery remembers Yitzhak Rabin, Yasser Arafat and the historic Oslo agreement that has since turned to mush. “The public memory,” Avnery warns, “is trying nowadays to obliterate” Rabin’s “inner revolution” toward peace with the Palestinians.

Rabin was assassinated 14 years ago this November.  —PZS

Uri Avnery in Gush-Shalom:

MORE THAN anything else, I respected Rabin for his dramatic change of outlook at the age of 70. The man who had been a soldier since he was 18, who had fought Arabs all his life, suddenly became a peace-fighter. And not just a fighter for peace in general, but for peace with the Palestinian people, whose very existence had always been denied by the leaders of Israel.

The public memory, one of the most effective instruments of the establishment, is trying nowadays to obliterate this chapter. Throughout the country one can buy postcards showing Rabin shaking hands with King Hussein at the signing of the Israeli-Jordanian peace agreement, but it is almost impossible to find a card showing Rabin with Arafat at the Oslo agreement signing ceremony. Never happened.

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