Washington Report on Middle East Affairs, December 2001, page 13

Special Report

 

The Assassination of Rehavam Ze’evi Does Not Kill Racism In Israel

 

By Donald Neff

Violence has its own inexorable logic, as old as the Old Testament. The Book of Exodus says Moses relayed the word from the Lord that “you shall give life for life, eye for eye, tooth for tooth, hand for hand, foot for foot, burn for burn, wound for wound, stripe for stripe.” That logic played itself out Oct. 17 with the assassination of Israeli Tourism Minister Rehavam Ze’evi, a harsh and implacable enemy of Palestinians who believed in the ethnic cleansing of all Palestinians from Eretz Israel.

The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine took responsibility for the targeted killing. Less than two months earlier, on Aug. 27, its leader, Mustafa Zibri (Abu Ali Mustafa), was killed when Israeli helicopters fired two missiles into his office in Ramallah and so, logically, the PFLP said Ze’evi’s killing was in retaliation for Zibri’s.

What was surprising to some observers was that the Palestinians had waited so long to begin targeting Israeli leaders. Israel itself had long carried out a policy of assassinating Palestinian leaders and militants. In fact, Israel’s armed forces had assassinated two suspected Palestinian militants only that week. Yet Palestinians had never assassinated a leading Israeli official in the country’s 53-year history. As the Oct. 18 Washington Post reported from the United Nations: “Many diplomats noted that Israel’s own policy of ‘targeted killings’ had contributed to the atmosphere that resulted in the assassination.”

Ze’evi, 75, a retired general and longtime member of the Knesset, was gunned down outside his room at the Jerusalem Hyatt, a luxurious complex located in occupied Arab East Jerusalem on Mt. Scopus. He regularly stayed at the hotel on the eighth floor, where he had a picturesque view of the Old City, which Ze’evi claimed belonged to Jews and which Israel now holds under military occupation.

Ze’evi had breakfasted downstairs with his wife and returned alone to his floor at 7 a.m. His assassin, or assassins, struck just outside his door. He was shot twice in the head, probably with an automatic with a noise suppressor. Guests later said they heard only muffled sounds; a shell casing believed to be a 38-cal. was found near his body.

His wife found Ze’evi soon afterward, sprawled on his back and bleeding heavily. “She was screaming and in hysterics,” said Dr. David Hocking, a Christian tour leader from Orange County, California, who rushed out from his room on the same floor on hearing the commotion. “It was obvious at once that he was dead.”

The cabinet minister who hated Palestinians with a passion was finally gone, but not his extremist views. Ze’evi was known to everyone as Gandhi, a sardonic sobriquet since his actions against Palestinians were anything but pacifistic. In life, Ze’evi’s outspoken racism shocked even some Zionists. He openly called Palestinians “lice” and a “cancer.” He campaigned for the “transfer” of all Palestinians from not only within Israel but in the West Bank and Gaza. Ze’evi believed, as he said on joining the Sharon cabinet earlier this year, that “we must find the [Palestinians’] weak, painful spots and press them until they crawl to us on all fours begging for a cease-fire.”

Ze’evi called the elder George Bush a “liar” and an “anti-Semite” when the American president opposed Israeli settlements in occupied territory in 1991. He called U.S. Ambassador Martin Indyk a “Jew boy” for urging Israel to make concessions in peace talks with the Palestinians. To Ze’evi, Yasser Arafat was a “viper” and “murderer” and former Prime Minister Ehud Barak was insane for negotiating with the Palestinian leader. Ze’evi ardently opposed the peace process, calling it worse than a waste of time.

Such inflammatory language brought criticism even from some old-line Jewish advocacy groups such as the Anti-Defamation League. Commenting on Ze’evi’s remarks last July about Palestinians as “lice,” Wayne Firestone, director of ADL’s Israel Office, said: “Referring to a group of people in such a derogatory and disparaging way is bigoted....In fact, such expressions of abhorrence and disdain are harmful to Israel’s interests and most unbecoming of an Israeli Minister.”

Despite such criticism, Ze’evi’s views matched those of Prime Minister Ariel Sharon and a growing number of Israelis. At a special session of the Knesset in Ze’evi’s honor, at which a black ribbon was draped across Ze’evi’s chair and the old general was eulogized, Sharon said: “He was first of all a friend, a comrade, and I shared his belief in the indisputable right of the Jewish people to their historical homeland.”

Sharon’s remarks were a reminder that Ze’evi’s passing was not the end of racism in Israel. Ze’evi’s original Moledet party led a coalition containing seven of the Knesset’s 120 seats, his followers all committed to “transferring” the Palestinians. There is little doubt that, if given the chance, Prime Minister Sharon would happily carry out Ze’evi’s dark dream.

Donald Neff is the author of the Warriors trilogy and 50 Years of Israel, available from the AET Book Club, and of Fallen Pillars: U.S. Policy towards Palestine and Israel since 1945.

< Prev		Next >