THE IRONY of the murder by a Zionist fanatic of Israeli PM Yitzhak Rabin is that one of the Middle East's leading war criminals is likely to be remembered as "a martyr for peace".
As a young officer in 1948 Rabin forcibly expelled tens of thousands of Palestinians from their homes in Lydda and Ramleh. In 1967, as Chief-of-Staff, he planned and acthe West Bank, East Jerusalem and the Golan Heights.
In 1987-9, as Defence Minister, he was responsible for the brutal repression of the Intifada, giving troops the notorious order to attack the Palestinians with "force, might 4. "who rules the territories".
Rabin's period as Prime Minis. the Israel-PLO "peace agreement" whith is an attemot to divide the Palestinian people by forcing the capitulation of the PLO leadership and its reconciliation with the Zionist project.
His murder reflects a - possibly raeli society, and the extent to moved towards the fundamentalist religious and nationalist right.
This was not the first political murder of a Jew carried out by Zionist extremists.
Among others, Dutch poet Jacob de Haan was killed in the 1920s when he renounced Zionism; Zionist leader Chaim Arlozorov was shot in 1935 because of his parallel negotiations with Nazi Germany and Palestinian leaders; peace activist Emil Gruenzweig was murdered during a Peace Now demonstration in 1983.
None of these murders was car. opposition leader Binyamin Netanyahu described Rabin's killer. Indeed, Israeli officials used the same phrase to explain the massacre of Palestinians in a Hebron mosque by an Israeli settler in February 1994.
In fact, all of these killings occurred when a climate of extremism had been fostered by the press shake? Rabin with Aralat, antagonising the extreme Zionists and the Zionist "moderate" right.
Observers in Jerusalem report that violence has been in the air for many months.
Israeli papers report that the Shin Bet had received reliable warnings of a threat to Rabin, and had even compiled a remarkably accurate psychological profile of a potential assassin, but Rabin had In a television interview recorded during the demonstration, Rabin's wife Leah was asked whether she was afraid for her husband's safety; she replied "Are you mad? This isn't Africa".
According to Tikva Parnas of the Revolutionary Communist League, the section of the Fourth International in the Israeli state, a civil war in Israel is unlikely because the "moderate" and parliamentary right has been severely shocked.
The Labour Party has been strengthened by the death of its martyr, and is likely to win the forthcoming elections through lack of a credible alternative. comfort to the struggling Palestinians, for whom Rabin, Peres, Netanyahu and now Arafat all reprosen weir oispossession.
Murderous internal struggle with in the rants of the oppressor will not, on its own, lead to their
on Hackney By Roy Leach THE INSPECTION blitz unleashed against every school in Lambeth and Waltham Forest has nothing to do with the needs of students and teachers. The cracked down ment policies. two boroughs.
The inspections will have a devastating cf.
It is clear how the inspection reports are intended to be used: the (2.11.95) said the govemment policy that will weed out 15.000 teachThis is just ône ex. ingly desperate and prehensive education in the run up to the general SOCIALIST OUTLOOK No.93, November 11 1995 Page 3 Fighting on profiteers in strikers at Hillingdon Hospital are standing firm agains! wage cuts by contractors Pall Mall