Yitzhak Rabin

Prime minister of Israel (1974-1977, 1992-1995)

• Born: March 1, 1922
• Birthplace: Jerusalem, Palestine (now in Israel)
• Died: November 4, 1995
• Place of death: Tel Aviv, Israel

Rabin was one of the giants of Israeli history. During the prestate years, he enlisted in the Palmach, the elite commando brigade that led the fight in Israel’s War of Independence, during which the country was invaded by overwhelmingly superior forces attempting to strangle it in its infancy. He rose to become chief of staff of the Israel Defense Forces, a two-term prime minister, and a Nobel Peace Prize winner.

Early Life

Yitzhak Rabin (YIHTS-ahk rab-EEN) was born in Jerusalem and named a Sabra, a native-born Israeli. His parents, a Ukrainian father and a Belarusian mother, were both committed Zionists who arrived in Israel in the years just before 1920. Rabin’s father was a volunteer in the British organized Israel Brigade, which was formed during World War I. His mother was an early member of Haganah, the unofficial Jewish prestate paramilitary organization and the predecessor of the Israel Defense Forces (IDF).

Rabin was raised in Tel Aviv and attended the Kadoori agricultural high school, a renowned institution located in the lower Galilee, which attracted the children of leading figures throughout the British Mandate of Palestine. He was an outstanding student who described his schooling as an experience that developed within him a sense of honor, duty, and trust.

Rabin joined the Palmach, the Haganah’s fighting force, not long after graduation and played a key role in Israel’s War of Independence (1948), a bitter war that saw 1 percent of the small Jewish population killed, many of them Rabin’s friends and classmates. Rabin’s future wife, Lea (née Schlossberg), also a Palmach member, wrote movingly in her memoirs of this period and of their personal losses.

Rabin rose rapidly through the ranks from brigade commander to chief operations officer and deputy commander of the central and then the southern front. At war’s end, in 1949, he participated in the armistice negotiations with Egypt. During this crucial period in Israel’s history, the young Rabin made what he described as a moral commitment to pursue a military career. During the war, he and Lea married, and they would have two children, Dalia and Yuval.

Life’s Work

With the end of the War of Independence and the establishment of the State of Israel, the Palmach was integrated into the IDF. By 1961, Rabin had become its deputy chief of staff and in 1964 was promoted to chief of staff, a position he held until 1968.

Due both to internal Israeli politics and the often raw hostility of the ongoing Arab-Israeli conflict, Rabin’s career and activities have often been the subject of controversy. A seminal event in Israeli history was the IDF’s shelling in 1948 of the Altalena, a cargo ship carrying tons of weapons and hundreds of fighters for Irgun, a paramilitary underground movement led by Menachem Begin (Israel’s future prime minister and a Nobel Peace Prize winner). Israeli provisional government head David Ben-Gurion considered the attempted landing of the cargo ship a divisive act that would lead to the formation of a militia in opposition to the IDF, or a military within a military. He ordered the shelling of the Altalena, which have traveled to coastal Tel Aviv. Rabin was in charge of carrying out Ben-Gurion’s orders. Lives were lost on both sides, causing an unhealed open wound for Israel.

Nearly twenty years after the Altalena conflict, tensions in Israel were again acute. During the days leading up to the decisive Six-Day War of 1967, Rabin finally approved a preemptive response to what many considered an existential threat, and his decision was hailed as an extraordinary example of military accomplishment. The Arab response bore with it the seeds of a new conflict. Refusing a request by the Israeli prime minister not to join the war, the Jordanian army began shelling Jerusalem. However, in responding to the attack, Israel quickly overcame the invaders and went on to capture East Jerusalem and the West Bank, areas that had been conquered by Jordan in 1948 and occupied by them until 1967.

In 1968, Rabin left the military to serve as Israeli ambassador to the United States, a post he held until 1973. After returning to Israel he became a member of the then-dominant Labor Party. The Yom Kippur War of 1973 caught Israel unprepared for a sudden and massive military incursion by Egypt and Syria (an incursion that also showed the modernization of Arab militaries), leading to heavy losses for Israel and to turmoil in the administration of Prime Minister Golda Meir , including her resignation. Rabin, who had no official part in the war, was elected leader of the Labor Party and then became prime minister in 1974. With the assistance of U.S. secretary of state Henry Kissinger’s tireless “shuttle diplomacy,” he produced an interim agreement between Israel and Egypt that was the precursor of the subsequent Camp David Accords, and, ultimately, the historic peace agreement between the two countries.

In 1977, Rabin again found himself in the center of controversy. An Israeli newspaper reported that Lea Rabin, contrary to currency regulations of the time, had a U.S. dollar bank account in the United States, and that she had kept that account since the days of her husband’s ambassadorship. In an extraordinary act of personal integrity, Rabin resigned his office.

Rabin, in 1984, was once more called to be defense minister and in 1987 once again found himself in the eye of the storm: the Arab uprising known as the Intifada, or First Intifada. Unprepared for the extent and intensity of the event, he adopted a hard-line approach, which was criticized as too severe by some. In 1988, the king of Jordan unilaterally decided to relinquish sovereignty over the Israeli-occupied West Bank, and Rabin began to search for a means of reaching a rapprochement with the Palestinians through diplomacy and direct negotiations.

In 1990, Rabin returned to his Knesset seat, but in 1992 was once more called upon to lead the country. He was selected prime minister in a landslide victory and, in spite of his lack of confidence in the Palestinian leadership, engineered the 1993 Oslo Peace Accords. Rabin, Palestinian leader Yasir Arafat, and Israeli statesman Shimon Peres were awarded the 1994 Nobel Peace Prize for their roles in the talks. A general sense of optimism swept the area, leading Jordan to become only the second Arab nation to sign a peace treaty (1994) with Israel.

Amid the euphoria, however, rejectionist Arab terrorist groups continued attacks both in Israel’s cities and on its borders. The lingering feeling that Rabin had given away too much too soon turned to a sense of betrayal among right-wing elements, and the rhetoric targeting Rabin became increasingly bitter and vitriolic.

A massive peace rally was held on November 4, 1995, in support of Rabin’s efforts. It was attended by thousands in the center of Tel Aviv. As Rabin was descending the podium after his speech, an embittered ideologue and student, Yigal Amir, shot Rabin in the back. Rabin died not long after. The site of the rally and his assassination has since been renamed Rabin Square.

Significance

Rabin was a central figure in the establishment and development of the State of Israel, a small but globally significant country that has been the focus of world attention throughout its relatively short history. Its small size belies its impact on global politics. At the time of Rabin’s assassination, Israel seemed on the verge of becoming a major player for peace and constructive democracy in the Middle East, a volatile region of conflict and ethnic hatred.

Years after Rabin’s death, Israel was again embroiled in a bitter battle for survival. Gone from the scene were most of the giants of Rabin’s generation, replaced by a new wave of leaders. Rabin is remembered by some as a saint for bringing some semblance of peace to the region, as transitory as it has been, and is remembered by others as a villain for taking certain risks in the face of danger, instability, and uncertainty.

Bibliography

Bloom, Gadi, and Nir Hefez. Ariel Sharon: A Life. New York: Random House, 2006. An objective and thoughtful biography of one of Rabin’s more controversial contemporaries. Sharon was a few years younger than Rabin and their careers both paralleled and intertwined. Adds a rare depth to Rabin’s portrait.

Bregman, Ahron. Israel’s Wars: A History Since 1947. 2d ed. New York: Routledge, 2002. Provides detailed analysis of the history of Israel’s wars and its conflicts with Palestinians. Chapter 6 is devoted to the Intifada of 1987.

Freedman, Robert O., ed. Israel’s First Fifty Years. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2000. Collection of scholarly essays narrates Israel’s political history. Begins with Israel’s relationship with the Soviet Union in the 1950’s and ends a few years after Rabin’s death.

Kissinger, Henry. Years of Upheaval. Boston: Little, Brown, 1982. An autobiographical account by the former U.S. secretary of state during a critical period in Rabin’s career. Kissinger was a major player, whose shuttle diplomacy brought Israel and its enemies together. His American perspective on Rabin’s role adds an extra dimension to understanding Rabin and his work.

Peri, Yoram, ed. The Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin. Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press, 2000. Collection of essays by an impressive group of Hebrew scholars presents a balanced account of Rabin’s murder and of the events that led up to it.

Rabin, Lea. Rabin: Our Life, His Legacy. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 1997. A very personal account of Lea Rabin’s life with her husband. This work is sometimes faulted for its occasionally gossipy tone, but it is clearly written from the heart. It offers a view into the attitudes and emotions of a couple in the center of global politics.