I don't know if the Rabin family held a household discussion about what line they would take at this year's memorial for assassinated Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, but it seems his grandchildren Noa Rothman and Yonatan Ben-Artzi decided they would revisit the harshest political standpoint, the one that characterized the first few years after he was murdered.
In recent years, it had appeared that the family, led by Rabin's esteemed daughter, Dalia Rabin-Pelossof, was moving in a more stately direction, adopting a conciliatory line intended to heal the rifts and find common ground within the nation.
That is why the decision of Rabin-Pelossof's two children is so surprising. Yet again, they assailed Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, and they did so in two relatively sacrosanct locations, no less: the President's Residence, a symbol of Israeli unity and democracy, and at Rabin's grave in the Great Leaders of the Nation section on Mount Herzl.
Sentiments that are tolerantly accepted in city squares and streets are perceived as part of the bag of tricks that harms the state's sovereignty. Of course, some will argue that these are the places such things should be voiced: in front of the nation and the prime minister. Rabin's grandchildren took the risk that their words would seep no deeper than the layer of daily punditry, a very thin and shallow layer, to be sure.
Rabin's remembrance day, as it was observed Sunday, sadly appears to have reverted to the obsessive nature of the past: His murder was the worst terrorist attack in the country's history, even more damaging to Israeli society than the Yom Kippur War. It seems we are unable to break free of endlessly reopening the wounds of Rabin's murder without reaching any type of deeper understanding.
The Israeli public, to the extent that it's possible to know what it wants, would like to settle on a suitable formula for observing Rabin's memory.
Instead of speeches that can be construed as political opportunism, the vast majority of the moderate Left and Right clearly would like Rabin's memory to be one of unity.
Rabin, regardless of his political endeavors, was a historic national figure. The Oslo Accords were essentially limited, much like the "peace accord" with Jordan that we learned about this week.
Rabin was much more than a leader who signed accords. He was at the epicenter of the main developments shaping the War of Independence and then the 1967 Six-Day War. He was the prime minister charged with rehabilitating the Israel Defense Forces and Israeli democracy in the 1970s, including after the devastation of the Yom Kippur.
However, we must be silent on the political assassination he carried out in 1977. We also must not mention his "without the High Court and without B'Tselem" comment.
As someone who studied that period, my impression is that during his supposedly disappointing first term as prime minister, Rabin played a more significant role than is attributed to him. His job of rehabilitating and building was a thankless one โ very similar to that of the prime minister who on Sunday sat like a sphinx in the face of denigration.
