Yitzhak Rabin

Shot on 4 November 1995 in Tel Aviv by the law student Yigal Amir; the prime minister was killed at a peace rally minutes after singing the song of peace.

Overview

Rabin, the soldier of the 1948 war and 1967 victory turned diplomat of Oslo, had signed the agreement with Arafat and King Hussein and won the Nobel Peace Prize with Peres and Arafat. After a rally of hundreds of thousands under the slogan yes to peace, no to violence, Amir, a religious nationalist who had studied the permissive killing of a Jewish leader delivering land, fired twice into the prime minister back at the parking level of Kings of Israel Square. Amir was sentenced to life; the Shamgar commission found security lapses without conspiracy. The square was renamed for Rabin. Peres lost the 1996 election to Netanyahu within months, the peace process froze, and the murder stands as the hinge on which the decade hopes turned. Rabin grandson speech at the twentieth anniversary is still quoted worldwide.