Today is the eight anniversary of the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, according to the Jewish calendar. And while it is hardly Rabin's fault, that assassination will be eternally linked in my mind - and I presume in many others - with the ferocious campaign against free speech launched by Rabin's followers after the murder.
The Oslo Left decided that the assassination had been caused by those who opposed the Oslo Accords and Rabin's policies exercising their right of free speech. The dogma of "words produced the bullets" was invented by the McCarthyist Left and its captive media, and has been repeated in the Israeli media so many thousands of times that few Israelis today even consider the hypothesis questionable.
In fact, the very idea that opponents of Oslo exercising free expression caused Yigal Amir to murder Rabin is not only preposterous, but it is the proof that Israel's Left is fundamentally anti-democratic. The "words produced the bullets" doctrine is a thinly-disguised attempt to paint all those who opposed or oppose Oslo appeasement as collectively guilty of the murder of Rabin. It is the fig leaf for Israeli leftist McCarthyism, the attempt to achieve political victory by stifling the speech of the anti-Oslo political opposition, by representing non-leftist speech as dangerous and illegal "incitement".
I vehemently opposed almost everything Rabin did as prime minister and said so openly. I believe that the 1,300 Israelis murdered since the first Oslo Accord are victims of the policies implemented by Rabin and Shimon Peres, when they turned the West Bank and Gaza into Nazi terrorist launch pads. The way to defeat those policies was democratically. Assassin Yigal Amir's crime was not only an assault on democracy, but it made Rabin's policies near-sanctified and unchallengeable. Yigal Amir bears considerable direct responsibility for Oslo's bloodbath continuing so long.
I am one of those old-timers who actually believe that non-leftists should also be allowed to express their views. I believed Rabin's policies endangered Israel and betrayed Israel's fundamental interests. And because I believed that, and still believe it - with a even greater certainty today - the McCarthyist Left has effectively declared that I am one of those people who murdered Rabin. So are you.
The same Left is responsible for the murders of 1,300 Israelis in the Oslo bloodbath. I do not think we can hold Rabin personally responsible for the assault on free speech launched by his followers after his death. Indeed, I like to imagine that if Rabin had lived, he would have understood the folly of Oslo, would have reversed it and tossed Beilin into the clink. No, I have no evidence this is what would have happened, but no one can prove it would not have happened.
But the assault against free speech for non-leftists continues, and is renewed every year on Rabin Memorial Day, when speakers and TV stations repeat over and over and over the lies that Rabin's death was caused by right-wing "inciters", that rabbis supposedly gave the okay to Amir to kill Rabin (except no one has ever managed to name or locate any such Rabbi), that the fact that some rightists used overheated rhetoric at anti-Oslo demonstrations is what killed Rabin, and that free speech by non-leftists (but not the deafening nonstop obscenity of leftist rhetoric) represents a clear and present danger of violence.
Last night's large memorial rally in Tel Aviv's Rabin Square constituted yet another Rabin Day partisan demand that Israelis submit and implement Rabin's policies, those failed policies that have already resulted in 1,300 murdered, and tens of thousands of destroyed families and lives. The rally themes insisted that Israelis implement "Rabin's Legacy," meaning his political agenda, in the form of Yossi Beilin's Geneva Misunderstandings, as the only effective way to commemorate Rabin.
Last night saw yet another annual Rabin Memorial Day Rally in which the lies were repeated. Rabin Memorial Day has become something other than a day to commemorate the fact that Israeli democracy was assaulted by a violent assassin, a day in which the prime minister of all Israelis, even of those like me who vehemently opposed his policies, is remembered. If it were such a day, then people like me could feel just as at home there in Rabin Square as anyone else. Instead Rabin Day has become a day in which the mantras of anti-democratic leftist McCarthyism are screamed and everyone is afraid to challenge them. It is a day for assaulting open debate and free exchange of ideas.
Shimon Peres last night declared, "Dear Yitzhak, those who incited against you have now chosen to follow your path." Oh really? Peres was clearly regurgitating the McCarthyist mantra that the Likud had "incited" against Rabin, that the Likud had plotted to have Rabin murdered, that Rabin was murdered because Bibi Netanyahu dared to call him some names, and because hotheads at Likud rallies carried banners claiming Rabin was a traitor.
And yes, in a sense, the Likud has indeed followed Rabin's path, to the detriment of the country. So, Peres joins the leftist McCarthyists and effectively insists that free speech by opponents of Oslo is a clear and present danger and so must be suppressed and prosecuted. There is very little difference between Peres' call and that of the chief McCarthyist of the five-member Meretz Knesset faction, Zehava Galon, who celebrated Rabin Memorial Day by filing a petition with the Attorney General to prosecute a columnist at Arutz-7's web site for "racism". The columnist had called for mass expulsion of Palestinians from the West Bank. Galon's party's platform is a call for mass expulsion of Jews from the West Bank.
In short, the Left still claims that everyone who disagrees with its dogmas is a criminal, an inciter, a murderer. And it is getting harder and harder to keep this vile anti-democratic leftist McCarthyism separate from the memory of the Rabin assassination.
A few years back, I had an interesting experience. My son?s elementary school class was in charge of the Rabin Day ceremonies at his school. Aside from my parental duty to applaud my son in obscenely loud tones, I was also curious to see how the public schools were running Rabin Day. After all, it is now obvious to all that Rabin's "conception" was flawed and that his policies have produced a growing bloodbath, that his PLO "peace partner" is nothing but a gang of murdering Nazis seeking to use its territories as a base to start a war that will destroy Israel and produce a new Holocaust. I should also add that my son?s school was a secular school.
The Rabin Day ceremony began with the principal standing before the entire school and announcing that today is the anniversary of the day Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated, and that he was killed for the simple reason that he was struggling for peace. Such an announcement of course left me nonplused. I agree that Rabin probably thought he was struggling for peace. But all those who adamantly opposed Rabin's policies, like me, also thought all along that they were struggling for peace. For that matter, I imagine that, in his own perverse way, even the assassin Yigal Amir thought he was struggling for peace.
The ceremony then continued with the children reciting Rabin quotation clips in which he announced to the Palestinians that we have had enough tears and blood and want to coexist with them. No choreographed child mentioned that the response to this from the PLO was ?Itbach al-yahud!? - Butcher the Jews!
The children then did some dancing and sang a bunch of songs about Jerusalem. How ironic, think I, that the proteges of Rabin are at this very moment trying to get the PLO back to the negotiating table so they can hand them half of Jerusalem, yet the school is presenting Jerusalem songs as "Rabin's legacy". (The pension fund outrage is a far more proven part of that legacy.) The children then raised their arms to heaven when Rabin was mentioned. Most are children who have never learned the basic Jewish prayers to Heaven.
In sum, it was my decided opinion that the main difference between Rabin Day ceremonies in Israel and those Cult of Personality school ceremonies in North Korea is that in North Korea, the school dancers are a lot better.
I remind you all that the Israeli McCarthyists fired a teacher three years ago because he suggested that such ceremonies be revised to emphasize the tragedy of an assassination of an elected leader in a democracy and not to celebrate the legacy of Rabin's disastrous policies.
The Oslo Left decided that the assassination had been caused by those who opposed the Oslo Accords and Rabin's policies exercising their right of free speech. The dogma of "words produced the bullets" was invented by the McCarthyist Left and its captive media, and has been repeated in the Israeli media so many thousands of times that few Israelis today even consider the hypothesis questionable.
In fact, the very idea that opponents of Oslo exercising free expression caused Yigal Amir to murder Rabin is not only preposterous, but it is the proof that Israel's Left is fundamentally anti-democratic. The "words produced the bullets" doctrine is a thinly-disguised attempt to paint all those who opposed or oppose Oslo appeasement as collectively guilty of the murder of Rabin. It is the fig leaf for Israeli leftist McCarthyism, the attempt to achieve political victory by stifling the speech of the anti-Oslo political opposition, by representing non-leftist speech as dangerous and illegal "incitement".
I vehemently opposed almost everything Rabin did as prime minister and said so openly. I believe that the 1,300 Israelis murdered since the first Oslo Accord are victims of the policies implemented by Rabin and Shimon Peres, when they turned the West Bank and Gaza into Nazi terrorist launch pads. The way to defeat those policies was democratically. Assassin Yigal Amir's crime was not only an assault on democracy, but it made Rabin's policies near-sanctified and unchallengeable. Yigal Amir bears considerable direct responsibility for Oslo's bloodbath continuing so long.
I am one of those old-timers who actually believe that non-leftists should also be allowed to express their views. I believed Rabin's policies endangered Israel and betrayed Israel's fundamental interests. And because I believed that, and still believe it - with a even greater certainty today - the McCarthyist Left has effectively declared that I am one of those people who murdered Rabin. So are you.
The same Left is responsible for the murders of 1,300 Israelis in the Oslo bloodbath. I do not think we can hold Rabin personally responsible for the assault on free speech launched by his followers after his death. Indeed, I like to imagine that if Rabin had lived, he would have understood the folly of Oslo, would have reversed it and tossed Beilin into the clink. No, I have no evidence this is what would have happened, but no one can prove it would not have happened.
But the assault against free speech for non-leftists continues, and is renewed every year on Rabin Memorial Day, when speakers and TV stations repeat over and over and over the lies that Rabin's death was caused by right-wing "inciters", that rabbis supposedly gave the okay to Amir to kill Rabin (except no one has ever managed to name or locate any such Rabbi), that the fact that some rightists used overheated rhetoric at anti-Oslo demonstrations is what killed Rabin, and that free speech by non-leftists (but not the deafening nonstop obscenity of leftist rhetoric) represents a clear and present danger of violence.
Last night's large memorial rally in Tel Aviv's Rabin Square constituted yet another Rabin Day partisan demand that Israelis submit and implement Rabin's policies, those failed policies that have already resulted in 1,300 murdered, and tens of thousands of destroyed families and lives. The rally themes insisted that Israelis implement "Rabin's Legacy," meaning his political agenda, in the form of Yossi Beilin's Geneva Misunderstandings, as the only effective way to commemorate Rabin.
Last night saw yet another annual Rabin Memorial Day Rally in which the lies were repeated. Rabin Memorial Day has become something other than a day to commemorate the fact that Israeli democracy was assaulted by a violent assassin, a day in which the prime minister of all Israelis, even of those like me who vehemently opposed his policies, is remembered. If it were such a day, then people like me could feel just as at home there in Rabin Square as anyone else. Instead Rabin Day has become a day in which the mantras of anti-democratic leftist McCarthyism are screamed and everyone is afraid to challenge them. It is a day for assaulting open debate and free exchange of ideas.
Shimon Peres last night declared, "Dear Yitzhak, those who incited against you have now chosen to follow your path." Oh really? Peres was clearly regurgitating the McCarthyist mantra that the Likud had "incited" against Rabin, that the Likud had plotted to have Rabin murdered, that Rabin was murdered because Bibi Netanyahu dared to call him some names, and because hotheads at Likud rallies carried banners claiming Rabin was a traitor.
And yes, in a sense, the Likud has indeed followed Rabin's path, to the detriment of the country. So, Peres joins the leftist McCarthyists and effectively insists that free speech by opponents of Oslo is a clear and present danger and so must be suppressed and prosecuted. There is very little difference between Peres' call and that of the chief McCarthyist of the five-member Meretz Knesset faction, Zehava Galon, who celebrated Rabin Memorial Day by filing a petition with the Attorney General to prosecute a columnist at Arutz-7's web site for "racism". The columnist had called for mass expulsion of Palestinians from the West Bank. Galon's party's platform is a call for mass expulsion of Jews from the West Bank.
In short, the Left still claims that everyone who disagrees with its dogmas is a criminal, an inciter, a murderer. And it is getting harder and harder to keep this vile anti-democratic leftist McCarthyism separate from the memory of the Rabin assassination.
A few years back, I had an interesting experience. My son?s elementary school class was in charge of the Rabin Day ceremonies at his school. Aside from my parental duty to applaud my son in obscenely loud tones, I was also curious to see how the public schools were running Rabin Day. After all, it is now obvious to all that Rabin's "conception" was flawed and that his policies have produced a growing bloodbath, that his PLO "peace partner" is nothing but a gang of murdering Nazis seeking to use its territories as a base to start a war that will destroy Israel and produce a new Holocaust. I should also add that my son?s school was a secular school.
The Rabin Day ceremony began with the principal standing before the entire school and announcing that today is the anniversary of the day Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated, and that he was killed for the simple reason that he was struggling for peace. Such an announcement of course left me nonplused. I agree that Rabin probably thought he was struggling for peace. But all those who adamantly opposed Rabin's policies, like me, also thought all along that they were struggling for peace. For that matter, I imagine that, in his own perverse way, even the assassin Yigal Amir thought he was struggling for peace.
The ceremony then continued with the children reciting Rabin quotation clips in which he announced to the Palestinians that we have had enough tears and blood and want to coexist with them. No choreographed child mentioned that the response to this from the PLO was ?Itbach al-yahud!? - Butcher the Jews!
The children then did some dancing and sang a bunch of songs about Jerusalem. How ironic, think I, that the proteges of Rabin are at this very moment trying to get the PLO back to the negotiating table so they can hand them half of Jerusalem, yet the school is presenting Jerusalem songs as "Rabin's legacy". (The pension fund outrage is a far more proven part of that legacy.) The children then raised their arms to heaven when Rabin was mentioned. Most are children who have never learned the basic Jewish prayers to Heaven.
In sum, it was my decided opinion that the main difference between Rabin Day ceremonies in Israel and those Cult of Personality school ceremonies in North Korea is that in North Korea, the school dancers are a lot better.
I remind you all that the Israeli McCarthyists fired a teacher three years ago because he suggested that such ceremonies be revised to emphasize the tragedy of an assassination of an elected leader in a democracy and not to celebrate the legacy of Rabin's disastrous policies.