Yitzhak Rabin assassination conspiracy theories
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Yitzhak Rabin assassination conspiracy theories arose almost immediately following the assassination of
Yitzhak Rabin Yitzhak Rabin (; he, יִצְחָק רַבִּין, ; 1 March 1922 – 4 November 1995) was an Israeli politician, statesman and general. He was the fifth Prime Minister of Israel, serving two terms in office, 1974–77, and from 1992 until h ...
, the
Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...
i Prime Minister, on November 4, 1995. The gunman
Yigal Amir Yigal Amir ( he, יגאל עמיר; born May 31, 1970) is an Israeli right-wing extremist who assassinated former Prime Minister of Israel, Yitzhak Rabin. At the time of the assassination he was a law student at Bar-Ilan University. The assas ...
, a
Jew Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""T ...
ish Israeli student, was apprehended within seconds by people in the crowd. Rabin died later on the operating table of Ichilov Hospital. Amir confessed to the assassination of Rabin. The matter has been reported as clear cut in the media, and the Shamgar national inquiry commission and the court all drew the same conclusion that Amir was guilty of murder. Nevertheless, some inconsistencies in the evidence have been alleged, both in the medical records and in the inquiry testimony. These allegations and other suspicions have been included in occasional left-wing, and more prevalent right-wing
conspiracy theories A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy by sinister and powerful groups, often political in motivation, when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources: * * * * The term has a nega ...
.


Conspiracy claims

Conspiracy theories have made some or all of the following claims. Others have been strident in opposing these conclusions. * Police reports state that
gunpowder Gunpowder, also commonly known as black powder to distinguish it from modern smokeless powder, is the earliest known chemical explosive. It consists of a mixture of sulfur, carbon (in the form of charcoal) and potassium nitrate (saltpeter). Th ...
was found on Rabin's body and clothing, suggesting that he had been shot at
point-blank range Point-blank range is any distance over which a certain firearm can hit a target without the need to compensate for bullet drop, and can be adjusted over a wide range of distances by sighting in the firearm. If the bullet leaves the barrel para ...
, as gunpowder travels only a very short distance before dispersing. According to the official version, Amir shot from a distance at which no powder traces could have settled on Rabin's body and clothing. * Surgery reports describe a bullet wound with the bullet entrance in the chest are inconsistent with the eyewitness reports and the
Kempler video The Kempler video is a film made by Roni Kempler while standing initially at the crime scene at the northeast side of the Tel Aviv City Hall and later on the roof of the "Gan Ha'ir" (City Park)-mall overlooking the crime scene before and during t ...
, which suggests that Rabin was shot in the back while walking away from Yigal Amir. Source of this provides link to a video in Hebrew and a written, inaccurate translation to English. Both versions, however, contain no hint that there was a chest entry wound, merely that there was a wound in the chest (can equally be an exit wound). Both versions report two gunshots rather than three. * Rabin would have walked after Amir's shots in a manner inconsistent with gunshot, an impossibility if they shattered the vertebrae. * Each medical record describes wounds which are "completely different" in nature to those concluded by the official Shamgar Commission. Medical descriptions of Rabin's condition are described as suddenly appearing to change. * An anonymous physician who consulted Barry Chamish opined that " e first two wounds, to the chest and abdomen occurred before Rabin's arrival. The third, frontal chest wound, had to have been inflicted after he entered the hospital," and that "it is inconceivable that Rabin had no spinal damage. The six members of the operating team were too skilled to have all been wrong about that." * Three police officers who had been present testified that "when Yitzhak Rabin was placed in the car, he showed no visible wounds."http://yigalamir.com/html_he/eduyot.html * Rabin's motorcade took 22 minutes to arrive at the hospital, even though he had a highly experienced chauffeur, and the streets were cordoned off. The distance between the crime scene and the hospital is a five-minute walk. * Police ballistics tests on shell casings found at the scene did not match Amir's gun. * No gunpowder residue was found on Amir's hands, clothing, or hair. Gunpowder residue would inevitably have been present if Amir had shot genuine bullets, as opposed to blanks. * No blood was seen coming from Rabin at the scene, despite wounds to his lung and spleen, nor was any found later at that location. By contrast witnesses describe blood "gushing" from a chest wound upon arriving at hospital. * Some witnesses stated that someone shouted, "It's nothing ... they're blanks. It's a toy gun." * A
Shin Bet The Israel Security Agency (ISA; he, שֵׁירוּת הַבִּיטָּחוֹן הַכְּלָלִי; ''Sherut ha-Bitaẖon haKlali''; "the General Security Service"; ar, جهاز الأمن العام), better known by the acronym Shabak ( he, ...
(secret service) agent testified that "I heard a policeman shout to people to calm down. The shot is a blank." * Policeman Moshe Ephron stated: "The shots didn't sound natural. If they were real shots, they should have sounded much louder." *
Leah Rabin Leah Rabin ( he, לאה רבין, née Schloßberg; 8 April 1928 – 12 November 2000) was the wife of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was assassinated in 1995. Biography Leah Rabin was born Leah Schloßberg in Königsberg, East Pruss ...
stated that a security guard told her immediately after the incident that the bullets shot at her husband were "blanks". She further stated that she was told by an Israeli security chief that she "should not worry as the whole thing had been staged." * Amir, who was employed by the Shin Bet in Latvia about two years before the murder, commented at a court hearing, "If I were to tell the whole truth, the entire system would collapse. I know enough to destroy this country." * Nahum Shahaf, an Israeli physicist who went on to play a major role in the
Muhammad al-Durrah On 30 September 2000, the second day of the Second Intifada, 12-year-old Muhammad al-Durrah () was killed in the Gaza Strip during widespread protests and riots across the Palestinian territories against Israeli military occupation. Jama ...
affair, has asserted that he had photographic evidence that the wrong man was being held for the assassination. He blamed the assassination on a conspiracy headed by Shimon Peres, who took over from Rabin as Prime Minister and later became the
President of Israel The president of the State of Israel ( he, נְשִׂיא מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, Nesi Medinat Yisra'el, or he, נְשִׂיא הַמְדִינָה, Nesi HaMedina, President of the State) is the head of state of Israel. The posi ...
.


Criticisms of the conspiracy theories

There are three types of criticisms of the conspiracy theories. The most common type refutes and relativizes claims made in the conspiracy theories or by the conspiracy theorists and points out that the theories are detached from Israeli political culture, social relations and historic events. This criticism is not necessarily politically "coloured" and may refer to both the right wing and left wing conspiracy theories. The other criticism focuses entirely on the more common, right wing theories. A second, mostly Israeli left-wing criticism, attacks the very existence of such theories as a denial of what they consider to be right wing "responsibility" for the murder. This "responsibility" for the murder would have been by creating an extreme hostile environment to the late Prime Minister, in which Yigal Amir and his immediate accomplices Hagai Amir and Dror Adani were just a small group of the actors. A third type of criticism, by right-wing activists, claims that the mostly Israeli right-wing conspiracy supporters embarrass the Israeli right by supporting fringe theories for which no proof exists. The conspiracy theorists, according to this criticism, move the debate away from the responsibility of what they call the "perpetrators of the Oslo crimes". These right-wing critics conclude that the right-wing conspiracy theorists serve the goals of the Israeli left."Rudstein – the man suing Peres admits he was FBI plant against right"
Voice of Judea TV, February 3, 2006


See also

*
Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin The assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, the fifth prime minister of Israel, took place on 4 November 1995 (12 Marcheshvan 5756 on the Hebrew calendar) at 21:30, at the end of a rally in support of the Oslo Accords at the Kings of Israel Square i ...
*
Kempler video The Kempler video is a film made by Roni Kempler while standing initially at the crime scene at the northeast side of the Tel Aviv City Hall and later on the roof of the "Gan Ha'ir" (City Park)-mall overlooking the crime scene before and during t ...
*
John F. Kennedy assassination conspiracy theories The assassination of President John F. Kennedy on November 22, 1963 spawned numerous conspiracy theories. These theories allege the involvement of the CIA, the Mafia, Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson, Cuban Prime Minister Fidel Castro, the K ...


Books

* Uri Barkan – ''Srak'', web-publication in
Hebrew Hebrew (; ; ) is a Northwest Semitic language of the Afroasiatic language family. Historically, it is one of the spoken languages of the Israelites and their longest-surviving descendants, the Jews and Samaritans. It was largely preserved ...
* Barry Chamish – ''"Who Murdered Yitzhak Rabin?"'', . * David Morrison – ''Lies: The Israeli Secret Service And The Rabin Assassination''


References


External links


"Geula Amir: Yigal didn't murder Rabin"
Ynet Ynet (stylized as ynet) is one of the major Israeli news and general-content websites, and is the online outlet for the '' Yedioth Ahronot'' newspaper. However, most of Ynet's content is original work, published exclusively on the website and wri ...

"Israel's Plague of Conspiracism"
by Professor Steven Plaut, published in the
Jewish Press ''The Jewish Press'' is an American weekly newspaper based in Brooklyn, New York, and geared toward the Modern Orthodox Jewish community. It describes itself as "America's Largest Independent Jewish Weekly". ''The Jewish Press'' has an online v ...
weekly, January 18, 2006
"A Mother’s Defense"
by Guela Amir, originally published in the defunct George Magazine, March 1997, p. 138
"10 years after murder, website asks who killed Yitzhak Rabin"
by Natalie Prishkolnik in
Ynet Ynet (stylized as ynet) is one of the major Israeli news and general-content websites, and is the online outlet for the '' Yedioth Ahronot'' newspaper. However, most of Ynet's content is original work, published exclusively on the website and wri ...
{{Conspiracy theories
Conspiracy theories A conspiracy theory is an explanation for an event or situation that invokes a conspiracy by sinister and powerful groups, often political in motivation, when other explanations are more probable.Additional sources: * * * * The term has a nega ...
Conspiracy theories involving Israel Rabin, Yitzhak