{josquote}A
man who sees himself as dwelling in ’a villa in the jungle’ since he regards
everybody else as beasts or savages, whom there is no need to communicate with,
to approach, to get to know or reconcile with.{/josquote}
Also
people less radical than this veteran Gush Shalom activist had their
considerable qualms. The call published by Peace Now reiterated that “The
continuing occupation, the expansion of settlements, but also the window of
possibility created by the upcoming Annapolis summit” made it “crucial for us
all this year, especially this year, to attend the rally and voice our call for
negotiations and peace”.
Nevertheless, former Peace Now Secretary General Moria Shlomot publicly
expressed her dilemma:
“Year
after year, I return to the Rabin Square, for the annual moment when the Peace
Camp stands up to be counted. This year I hesitate. I am not tired, nor did I
forget, but the name of Ehud Barak lies heavy on my conscience - a name with
which I have no wish whatsoever to be counted as part of the same political
camp.
Ehud Barak: leader of the Israeli Labour Party, builder of settlements, provoker of the Al-Aqsa Intifada, the man who caused the most dangerous fissure with the Israeli Arabs, the greatest believer in unilateralism.
A
man who sees himself as dwelling in ’a villa in the jungle’ since he regards
everybody else as beasts or savages, whom there is no need to communicate with,
to approach, to get to know or reconcile with. Barak ordered the electricity of
Gaza cut off in response to the shooting of Quassam missiles, even when knowing
that the shooting would only increase due to this move. He knows - but still he
prefers to cover his paucity of ideas and absence of moral values by an act
which would make Israel hated all over the world.
Barak
represents the very opposite of what Rabin represented at the end of his days.
For most of us, Rabin represented exactly the shrugging off of the illusions of
power, the greatness of a man undergoing a complete reversal of outlook at a far
from young age.
Barak
is not Rabin`s successor, and I am deeply disappointed that this year he would
get to mount a podium which should have been reserved for true people of peace.”
(Yisrael Hayom, November 1 - Full text at http://www.kibush.co.il/show_file.asp?num=23217
)
Despite
all qualms, when the evening of the rally came by we set out for the Rabin
Square, equipped with a folding table and carriage heavily laden with printed
material – feeling nostalgic for last year, when active politicians were banned
from the podium and an impressive keynote speech delivered by writer David
Grossman.
On
hearing our destination, the taxi driver burst out: “That’s very good, there
should be many people there! This dirty murderer, Yigal Amir – how dare he make
this dirty show with the circumcision? And the judges let him get away with it!
He should have been hanged, yes, hanged! We have no capital punishment, but for
the murder of a Prime Minister, we should have made an exception. Yes sir! I did not hold with Rabin’s
views, but this is really unforgivable. He should be happy that he got away with
his life, he should never have gotten anything more. No conjugal visits to have
sex with that crazy woman who married him, no visits at all. No privileges. Just
lock him up like a dog, yes like a dog, and throw away the key.”
This
kind of vindictive feeling was quite widespread in this year’s rally, fuelled by
the new extreme-right campaign openly calling for Amir’s release and by the
coincidence of the Amir child’s circumcision talking place on precisely the
anniversary of the murder. (In some views, indeed, it was no coincidence at all,
but diabolically clever planning of the conjugal visit’s date by Amir and his
wife Larissa.)
The
signs and stickers reading “We shall neither forgive nor forget” seemed more
common than in other years, and there were yellow unsigned leaflets actually
calling for the enactment of a “retroactive capital
punishment.”
We
had an appropriate response, a Gush Shalom leaflet in the form of a
multiple-choice questionnaire:
How
to honour the memory of Itzchak Rabin
[]
To show tolerance towards those who hated him?
[]
To curse Yigal Amir by day and by night?
[]
To continue on Rabin's road: negotiate for peace with those whom the
Palestinians have elected as their representatives?
Find
the right answer and you win a good future for
“Thank
you, I was starting to feel that I was all alone in thinking that the big fuss
was exaggerated. Sure, he is a murderer; but isn't he being punished already? I
came here for other, more important issues," said a youngster who apparently did
not belong to any of the Blue Shirt youth groups but had come all by himself –
and very happy to find the Gush Shalom table, decorated with two-flag placards
and a variety of explicit stickers.
“What
is this? Talk to the Hamas? I think this sticker is premature, the time has not
yet come for such a step” said the man with the big dog. “Why premature? We have
come here to honour Rabin. Would you have stopped Rabin from going to Oslo? Also
then there were people saying it was premature to start talking to start talking
to the PLO.” “But they are shooting missiles, every day! What if some of our
kids get killed!” “And we have already killed many of their kids, even if the
media hardly reports it. We should make a cease-fire, no shooting of us on them
or of them on us. We should do it before anybody else gets killed.” “Well,
perhaps… I don’t know, the Prime Minister should be thinking about all
this…”
Meanwhile,
at the front – where you could be seen by the speakers on the podium, and more
importantly by the TV crews - groups of youths are jockeying for position,
wearing various kinds of shirts – Peace Now, Meretz, the Blue Shirts of the
Working and Learning Youth. Enormous banners, each needing ten of more people to
lift, lie on the ground, ready for the starting moment. We have declined to
enter this race, circulating instead in the midst of the crowds fast entering
the square from all directions. We are not the only ones, quite a few other
groups are making use of this opportunity, the best in the whole
year.
Peace
Now and the Geneva Initiative have jointly launched a new graphic design, seen
everywhere on big placards and small stickers: a bullet and a pen facing each
other, with the caption “This is the Time! Choose for Peace!”
The
Meretz Youth have “Peace was not murdered – Yithchak’s way will prevail”. Youths
from the Galilee distribute an impassioned manifesto: “We youths must rise and
cry out that we believe in Peace and Equality, that we believe in the Freedom of
Speech and Human Rights, that we will never forgive and never forget the murder
of Rabin. We must cry out now, or we won't much longer have a democracy!”
”The
slaughtering of animals is political murder, too” asserts the leaflet of the
‘Anonymous’ groups. “It is murder because animals have as much right to live as
human beings; it is political because the entire political spectrum supports
it”.
At
the Peace Now table, signatures are collected on a petition calling upon Olmert to “Sign
peace within a year", and
invitations to a meeting where a glimpse
“behind the scenes of the Annapolis Peace Conference” is promised – as
well as a brochures entitled “a beginners’ course on the settlements”, based on
the findings of the movement’s famed Settlement Watch Team.
For
their part, the Hadash Communists distribute a flyer entitled: “Why the
Annapolis summit will not be a peace conference?” and giving the answer: “The
Olmert-Barak Government has no intention of really ending the occupation. The
moves to extend settlements at the E-1 area east of Jerusalem, and the cruel new
invention of cutting off Gaza’s water and electricity, testify to the reality
behind the words of peace”.
At
another table, signatures are collected on a petition “against the shirking of
military service, and for an equal division of the burden”. A youth is engaged
in a hot debate: “Better to shirk the army than to serve the occupation!” “This
is a rally for Rabin, and he was a military man most of his life. You extreme
leftists are in the wrong place!” “Rabin made peace and was murdered for it. On
the last hour of his life, right here in this square, he embraced Aviv Gefen –
an artist who refused military service. It is you, the militarists, who are in
the wrong place!”
The
debate is cut short by the recorded voice of Rabin himself, strong and confident
on the last evening of his life, followed by the recording of the announcement
of his death at the hospital gates a few hours later, and then the singing of
“Captain, my Captain” – Walt Whitman’s lament for the assassinated Abraham Lincoln,
which was translated to Hebrew, set to music and applied to
Rabin.
After
some more singing, the first speaker: Shimon Peres. He was always very popular
in this millieu; all the more so tonight, his first appearance here as President
of Israel. His words are punctuated by frequent cheers and clapping:
“Yitzchak
Rabin wanted peace, and I had the honour to be his partner in the efforts to
achieve it. He wanted peace, not as an abstraction but as a simple daily
reality. He wanted to wipe away the bereaved mother’s tears. He wanted to end
forever these terrible moments at the doorstep, where the parents look at the
army’s emissaries and know that they lost forever what was most precious to
them. Rabin wanted a situation where nobody will ever again feel threatened by a suicide bomber or a
falling missile. Rabin wanted peace, and for that he was
murdered.
Rabin
was murdered, but you are here. You, all of you here, are his inheritors, his
torch-bearers. You have come here, not only to commemorate a person who was so
tragically cut down. You have come here to carry on his task, the achievement of
peace. To go on undaunted, not to
panic, not to despair, to stand fast like a rock against all who seek to derail
you - to hold on to the struggle for peace. You are Rabin’s inheritors, you are
the Rabin heritage. You are the torchbearers!” (enormous applause).
Several
minor speakers, to whose words nobody pays much attention. Aharon Barn’ea, the
moderator, announces: “The entire square is full, as are the streets all around.
It is estimated that some 150,000 people are here tonight!” (cheers). Some more
singing. The dirigible with its security cameras crisscrosses the sky above the
square; tomorrow, Gideon Levy would remark in Ha’aretz that dirigibles of the
same kind are patrolling above Gaza, pin-pointing Palestinian targets for the
Air Force.
The
two approaching the Gush Shalom table are in their early twenties. One,
otherwise in civilian clothing, has a faded khaki t-shirt with the caption
“Armoured Corps, Tank Commanders’ Training Course – April 2005”. The other’s
shirt has “Mañana
Hotel,
Managua, Nicaragua”. Without a word they pick up the round stickers with the
joined Israeli and Palestinian flags, put them on their shirts and depart
smiling. And then the amplified voice from the loudpeakers: “Ladies and
Gentlemen, I give you the Defence Minister of Israel, Mr. Ehud
Barak”.
A
thin spatter of applause. As Barak mounts the podium on the
“This
is a most important occasion, and this crowd gathered here is a most important
crowd, gathered to do honour to a great man who has fallen, and I feel it as an
honour to be here tonight to address you” says the great amplified voice of
Barak. He pauses for effect and meets complete silence. He then goes on to
praise Rabin to the heavens. Yitzchak Rabin was a great man, a great leader, a
man of exemplary honesty and probity, not like the leaders the country has
nowadays. He regarded being a Prime Minister as a mission and trust, not just a
workplace. (Olmert had said, less than two months ago, that he regards the PM’s
bureau as “the place where I work"). Rabin, Barak goes on to say, did an
enormous lot for Israel. He renovated the educational system, he built up a lot
of infrastructure, and yes, among other things he was also involved in
peace-making. Yigal Amir who murdered him is a real nasty bastard. “I pledge to
you tonight, yes I pledge: this foul murderer will never be set free, he will be
behind bars to his last day, he will never see the light of day!”. That was the
only moment when Barak did get a cheer out of this crowd.
Then
he goes on to other things: Israel is threatened on all sides, by Iran, Syria,
Hizbullah, Hamas – but all these enemies should beware, for the Israeli armed
forces are strong and ready. And finally, Barak notes that a conference is about
to take place in Annapolis, and that he definitely does not not regard it as a
threat, but on the contrary as a chance, a good chance – though one should not
expect too much. (This is about the most positive thing which Barak has uttered
on the subject, since the conference idea started to be mooted). After a few
more cliches he concludes his speech – again to the sound of silence. Icy,
eloquent silence throughout the square.
Throughout
Barak’s long and rather disjointed speech we circulate in the crowd, furiously
giving out copy after copy of Gush Shalom’s Gaza leaflet. No way of flinging it
in the face of the arrogant speaker – a face seen on the giant screens set up
all over the square. But at least it could be given out to quite a few
interested people in the crowd:
Electricity,
the Red Herring
By
forbidding the cutting off of electricity, Attorney General Mazuz prevented
Israel from arousing the anger of the entire world. But the collective
punishment he didn't stop, the ever tightening siege of the Gaza
Strip.
The
State of Israel prevents the entry of vital goods – from fuel to baby food and
everything in between. No one is allowed in or out - neither students on their
way to study nor terminal patients in urgent need of medical
care.
Today,
eighty percent of the Gazans are under the poverty line – without money to buy
what the shops still have.
And
the result? The Army’s experts expect that the collective punishment will only
increase the shooting of missiles.
Meanwhile,
up on the stage Aviv Gefen is singing, like every year: ”I am going to sing for
you, my brother/my longing is like doors opening in the night…” He then leaves
off, and thousands of young throats continue the song on their own: “Forever, my
brother, forever I will remember you/and we will meet again in the end, you
know”. It was originally composed as a dirge for a young man killed in a
motorcycle accident, half a year before Rabin was assassinated – but hardly
anybody remembers this now, it has become a central part of the Rabin
Canon.
And
then – the most intriguing speaker: Yuval Rabin, the son. He had not really been
involved in politics until his father's death. In the immediate aftermath of the
murder he was a central figure in the Dor Shalom (Peace Generation) movement,
which rose meteorically – only to disappear just as swiftly and leave no trace.
He then went on a decade of self-imposed comfortable exile in the US, and was
hardly heard of – until suddenly coming back a few weeks ago, claiming his right
as son (and heir?) to deliver the keynote speech in his father’s
memorial.
Yuval
Rabin starts by giving the crowd a massive dose of Amir-bashing: “Judge
Gurfinkel allowed my father’s murderer, and the murderer’s friends and relatives
who support him and applaud his crime, to hold this circumcision ceremony and
celebration inside the prison on the very anniversary of his murderous crime.
Judge Gurfinkel said that he could not deny it because this is a major rite of
Judaism and Yigal Amir is a Jew. A Jew? Is he a Jew? Funny, I always thought
that the very heart and core of Judaism was the Ten Commandments, which the
whole world identifies with us, and that the most important and fundamental of
the Ten Commandments was ‘Thou Shalt not kill’. But it seems that Judge
Gurfinkel has other criteria and definitions.
But
enough of this contemptible killer. The important thing to remember is that he
did not act alone. No, he did not act alone. One finger pulled the trigger, but
many hands pushed the killer to this square, to commit his deed. The hands of
those who incited and shouted ‘traitor!’ and marked out my father for
death.
I
look at you here, filling this square, and I am deeply moved. I remember that
this was nearly the very last sight which my father ever saw, and I am even more
deeply moved. The blood which flowed from his body and was irretrievably lost
had stained the page which was in his pocket, the words of the Peace Song. You
all know it very well, and still I want to repeat it to you here: “Don’t say ‘a day will
come’/ bring the day!/and in every square/cry out for
peace!.”
The
story is not ended. It is starting again. A Prime Minister makes a first
cautious step, and already he is attacked and vilified, already the incitement
begins. We know how it is when a prime minister who tries to make peace is
abandoned, left alone in the face of inciting mobs, as my father was for many
months. It must not happen again! Ehud Olmert, if he fulfils the dream and hope
of peace, fully deserves your support".
So,
Yuval Rabin did not after all claim the mantle of Yitzchak Rabin for himself,
but rather threw it over the shoulders of Ehud Olmert . And this conclusion was
greeted with an enormous applause.
Prime
Minister Olmert, who did not attend the memorial in the Rabin Square, made
within twenty-four hours an impeccable dovish televised address in which he took
up the theme and greedily posed as Rabin heir. It was too good to be true - to
be offered such a role and a constituency willing to support him in it, after a
full year in which he led Israel with no more than single digit popularity
ratings.
There
is no doubt that Olmert would like to prolong this situation of being seen as
the one charged with "finishing the work of Rabin". Being seen – definitely. But
as yet, we don't see signs of what we did sometimes feel to be the case with
Rabin - in spite of all what was wrong at that time, and without forgetting the
numerous occasions that we demonstrated against him – but still, there seemed to
be in Rabin a genuine determination to move forward on the road towards peace.
And that is not exactly what Olmert conveys.