Israel Matzav

Yadlin: Rabin would have lost the '96 elections

I will never forget the morning after the 1996 elections. The Leftists - which was most of my government office at the time - were walking around crying because Binyamin Netanyahu had beaten Shimon Peres in an election six months after Prime Minister Yitzchak Rabin was assassinated. I and the two other rightists in the office kept to ourselves to avoid being ostracized.

Now former military intelligence chief Amos Yadlin says that had he not been assassinated, Rabin would have lost that election anyway.

Today's edition of Yediot Ahronot features a "what if" article asking various Israelis to speculate how things would be different today if various events had not taken place.

Question: What would have happened if Rabin hadn't been murdered?

Yadlin: He would have lost the elections in any event to Binyamin Netanyahu in '96. The public atmosphere in the country was that the Oslo process failed, the terror attacks of Jihad and Hamas were unacceptable and Rabin himself would have reconsidered Oslo. I have no doubt that he lost his trust, if he even had it, in Yasser Arafat.

Question: And the claims that we would be after Oslo today, with two states for two peoples?

Yadlin: That has no basis in reality.

But don't expect the Left to acknowledge this or to retry Yigal Amir  - who was convicted by a lynch mob mentality of the assassination.

Labels: Binyamin Netanyahu, Middle East peace process, Oslo accords, Shimon Peres, Yasser Arafat, Yigal Amir, Yitzchak Rabin

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 10:55 PM