Yitzhak Rabin assassinated

On the evening of November 4, 1995, Yitzhak Rabin, prime minister of Israel, was shot in the back at close range as he walked to his car after a large peace rally in Kings of Israel Square in Tel Aviv (now Rabin Square). He died in a hospital soon after. The killer was Yigal Amir, a 25-year-old Israeli law student and religious nationalist who said he acted to stop the Oslo peace process and the handing of land to the Palestinians. He was caught on the spot.¹²³

Rabin, a former army chief and hero of the Six-Day War, had become a champion of compromise. In 1993 he signed the Oslo Accords, shaking hands with Yasser Arafat on the White House lawn, and Israel and the PLO recognized each other. In 1994 he made peace with Jordan and shared the Nobel Peace Prize with Arafat and Shimon Peres. The process faced fierce opposition. Right-wing and settler groups held angry rallies, some where Rabin was depicted in a Nazi uniform, and rabbis publicly debated whether he could be called a traitor under religious law. Palestinian militants carried out suicide bombings that further hardened opinion.²

The assassination shocked Israelis, who had seen political violence before but not against a prime minister by a Jew. Shimon Peres became prime minister, but in May 1996 Benjamin Netanyahu narrowly won an election that followed a wave of bombings, and the peace process slowed. Amir was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. The killing remains a defining moment in Israeli memory, and the debate over whether the Oslo process could have succeeded had Rabin lived continues.¹³