How could a man who resigned from his position as prime minister of
Israel in 1977 because of a bank account scandal, whose first term
in office (1974 - 1977) was, to put it mildly, considered
uninspiring, reemerge to become a statesman who leads his country
to major breakthroughs toward peace?
In February 1993 the late philosopher/gadfly Prof. Yeshayahu
Leibowitz, was still wondering out loud whether Rabin wasn't "a
complete fool," yet one of his last requests before he died was
that the negative references to the prime minister in the
soon-to-be-published English version of his book be deleted, since
he now (in July 1994) considered him "a great leader."
In the same spirit, on October 10, 1994 Sever Plocker wrote an
editorial in the mass circulation daily Yediot Achronot, which is
read by seventy percent of the Hebrew newspaper-reading public,
headlined "The Man of History." In flowery, almost embarrassing
language, he wrote: "The world is filled with small and mediocre
people. Yitzhak Rabin is a great man. When we count the great
Jewish leaders of the twentieth century, three names will come
before all others: Herzl, Ben-Gurion, Rabin." Yet Rabin, the Nobel
Prize winner, inspires right-wing taunts of "Rabin is a traitor"
and lately even cries of "Death to Rabin" have been heard at
anti-government demonstrations, the first time that such a
murderous phrase has been hurled at an Israeli prime minister. Who
could have imagined that minor Labor leader Rosa Cohen's son would
ever inspire such emotion, pro and con?
Robert Slater, the longtime resident correspondent for Time
magazine in Israel (who has lived in the country since 1971) tries
to solve the riddle of Yitzhak Rabin in his book Rabin of Israel,
first published in 1977 and updated in 1993. Slater agrees that
Rabin "lacks charisma. He's certainly no Ben-Gurion, no Begin, no
Golda Meir ... he does not mesmerize ... does not charm ... [he's]
almost the last person around whom one could try to form a
personality cult."
So just what has made Rabin, the first and so far only native-born
Israeli prime minister, "so incredibly popular? .. The people trust
him on the only issue that matters to them: national
security."
Slater poses an interesting theory as to how Rabin reemerged as the
national leader in 1992, overcoming both inflexible hawkish Likud
leader Yitzhak Shamir and his perennial Labor Party rival, Shimon
Peres. During his first term as prime minister, Rabin was the dove
while Peres, his defense minister, was the hawk. "In the ensuing
years," writes Slater, "the image¬ makers would increasingly
depict Shimon Peres as a political dove - to his detriment. These
same image-makers turned Rabin into a political hawk, to his great
advantage." According to this theory, only a hawk like Begin, De
Gaulle, Nixon and the revamped Rabin could have the security
credentials necessary to make peace.
The reader can learn from this book a number of interesting
aspects, cardinal to an understanding of Rabin's personality. First
of all, any suggestion that Rabin might have left Labor for the
Revisionist Likud is belied by his background and by his own
statements. His mother, Rosa Cohen, was an activist who originally
supported the 1917 Revolution in her native Russia. Disillusionment
with the Revolution and anti-Jewish pogroms led her to move to
Palestine where she became a Labor leader in Haifa, and later in
Tel Aviv. Rosa Cohen dedicated her life to defense and labor,
becoming the first commander of the Haifa Hagana (Jewish
self-defense force), and later a member of the Supreme Command of
the Organization. She was also elected to serve on the Tel Aviv
City Council where she was an outspoken supporter of workers'
rights in that bourgeois city.
His father, Nehemia Rabin, was active in Socialist-Zionist circles
in Chicago for thirteen years, having moved to the U.S. from
Russia. In Palestine he became active in the Labor movement, and
served in various capacities in the Histadrut (General Federation
of Labor). He even carried the red flag at the annual May Day
parade.
In 1924 the workers' organization in Tel Aviv organized the first
workers' school, known as the Beit Hinuch (House of Education). The
Rabins enrolled young Yitzhak in the school, which educated toward
"the goals of both the Labor movement and Zionism. The school not
only supplied the fundamentals of education, but also furnished the
children with an ideology, a direction ... " Yitzhak also naturally
joined a Labor-oriented youth movement, Hanaar Haaved (Working
Youth) and used to get into street fights with the right-wing Betar
youth. Slater notes that Rabin was preparing himself for life on a
kibbutz (his sister is a kibbutz member): "he seemed destined for a
career in agriculture and would have thought it 'absurd' if the
idea of becoming a military figure would have been suggested to
him."
This background explains his unequivocal statement in 1975 that "I
am a socialist, I believe in the paramount importance of the
productive worker," and his advocacy in 1992 of "a change in our
national priorities." It also explains why the young Rabin had no
qualms about commanding the Palmach's armed confrontation with the
Revisionist Irgun ship Altalena which was sunk off the coast of Tel
Aviv in September 1948 together with a cargo of 5,000 rifles, 280
light machine guns and a number of anti-tank weapons (which
Ben-Gurion feared were to be used against the legal
government).
Rabin's pro-American orientation is very evident in the book. "I
was brought up on my father's stories about the United States,"
Rabin told the author. "He always used to say it was the country in
which he learned the meaning of freedom, had seen the taste for
education, and where organizations existed to fight for workers'
rights." For a long time Rabin wanted to spend an extended period
in the States. He made his first attempt when, after winning the
top scholarship prize at high school, he planned to study water
engineering at the University of California.
He finally made it in 1969 after completing his triumphant tour of
duty as IDF chief of staff. He actually volunteered, and lobbied
for the position of Israeli ambassador to the United States. For
Rabin, his three years as an envoy were like "a seminar on the
problems of the U.S.," and Washington was "the best school in which
to learn world politics. I wouldn't have learned what I did in ten
years at university," he said.
This American orientation served him well in 1992 when he
understood that his readiness for a settlement freeze (which the
Likud rejected) would gain Israel $10 billion in loan guarantees
and go a long way toward winning the Israeli elections. However, it
was Peres's European orientation which enabled the foreign minister
to appreciate and exploit the Oslo channel of Israeli-Palestinian
talks, while Rabin was focusing on the relatively sterile
Washington-based bilateral negotiations.
The third dominant factor in Rabin's life is of course his
commitment to national security. Circumstances, rather than
conscious intention, led Rabin to take up a military career. He
joined the pre-state Palmach when there was a genuine fear of a
Nazi invasion of Palestine during World War II. His first mentors
were Moshe Dayan and, in particular, Yigal Allon, to whose
political principles he tried to remain faithful. He found the
Palmach stimulating and it was felt that "here was someone with a
bright military future. Rabin's self-confidence stemmed from his
uncanny foresight and his own thoroughness."
Rabin went on to playa major role in the 1948 War of Independence
and to gain his national reputation as the victor of the Six-Day
War. It was the latter which Slater calls Rabin's "calling card for
political leadership." Eventually he replaced Moshe Dayan as "Mr.
Security." Like Dayan, he possessed "a rare combination for an
Israeli politician: the ability to convey toughness in dealing with
Arab violence and a sincerity to strive for peace."
Does the book explain how it came about that Yitzhak Rabin would
one day take responsibility for the Oslo accords, and shake Yasser
Arafat's hand on the White House lawn? While he was serving as
defense minister during the stormy days of the Intifada, Ephraim
Sneh (then head of the Israeli Civil Administration and today
minister of health) "couldn't detect any emotions on Rabin's part
toward the Palestinians, not positive, not negative." Rabin
initially misunderstood and underplayed the meaning and importance
of the Intifada as an assertion of Palestinian national resistance.
He thought it could be subdued by physical force, though according
to Slater he [Rabin] insists that he never used the phrase "break
their bones."
During this period the Palestinians clearly viewed him as a brutal
and uncompromising enemy. However, by February 1988 he acknowleded
that "I've learned something during the last two and a half months.
Among other things, you can't rule by force over one and a half
million Palestinians." By 1992 he was saying: "If elected, I will
undertake to reach an agreement with the Palestinians within six to
nine months," and "I am unwilling to give up a single inch of
Israel's security, but am willing to give up many inches of
territories - as well as 1,700,000 Arab inhabitants - for the sake
of peace." However, in February 1993, when Slater completed the
updating of his book, Rabin was still unwilling to negotiate with
the PLO.
So what made him change his mind, to assume responsibility for the
Oslo accords and to become a key factor in the selling of the
Israeli-PLO agreement to the general Israeli public? Perhaps a clue
can be found in a quote from Oded Messer, one of Rabin's senior
assistants back in 1956: "Some say he is unable to make decisions,
but I don't believe this is so. If they mean the ability to make
quick decisions, they are right. He is perhaps slow to make a
decision. But when he decides, the decision is based on sound
judgment. He sticks to the decision and uses every means to carry
it out."
Slater concludes that in the 1990s the State of Israel no longer
requires "towering figures ...icons ... heroes" who inspire "acts
of bravery." It needs pragmatists who can "figure out how to end
the state of belligerency with the rest of its Arab neighbors ...
[and to] come to grips with the fact that peace has a price,
perhaps a heavy one ...It has not been easy, but Rabin has learned
how to exhibit the rare combination of toughness and flexibility
needed to fulfill this role."
To be forthright, the major value of Rabin of Israel is that it is
the only biography of Yitzhak Rabin in existence. Though not the
authorized biography, it was clearly written with Rabin's, and his
wife's and associates' cooperation. While not devoid of criticism,
it is the version of his life that the prime minister would
probably want to circulate.
Like the man himself, the book is uncharismatic, and far from being
a smooth read. It does touch upon Rabin's collapse on the eve of
the Six-Day War and on his bitter rivalry with Shimon Peres, who
was ironically to become his co-recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize.
The ability of Rabin and Peres to work together today despite their
long rivalry is a key to the political success of the current
government.
Yet much is left unsaid and unexplained. Perhaps part of the
problem lies in Slater's sources. There is no indication that he
talked to Shimon Peres in the course of preparing the book. Nor
with Deputy Foreign Minister Yossi Beilin, an astute observer of
Israeli politics whose doctoral thesis was devoted to "Fathers and
Sons in Mapai and Mapam." Or even with Knesset Speaker Shevah
Weiss, a noted political scientist and member of Rabin's
camp.
There are, for example, no quotes from Uri Avneri's iconoclastic
Haolam Hazeh magazine, or from New Outlook, both of which observed
Rabin and his political environment over the years. Had he read
them, Slater would have known that during his first term as prime
minister, Gen. (Res.) Mattityahu Peled, who served together with
Rabin on the General Staff, always reported directly to the prime
minister, at his request, about his meetings in the mid-1970s, on
behalf of the Council for Israeli-Palestinian Peace with PLO envoy
Dr. Issam Sartawi. These discussions were among the first
indications of the possibility for serious Israeli-PLO dialogue. In
general, Slater seems to have avoided serious conversation about
his subject with the Israeli academic and journalistic
community.
Yet with all its flaws, it's the only book about Rabin that we've
got.
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