“Peace for territories.” The formula with which the Prime Minister of Israel, Yitzhak Rabin, defended before the Israeli parliament and society the fruits of the Oslo Accords of 1993 continues to be the basis of the fragile balance in which Israel and Palestine coexist. Neither peace has been consolidated in the three decades since then, despite no war having been declared, nor do the Palestinian territories have full sovereignty. To the point that a terrorist group is the one that exercises de facto power in the Gaza Strip instead of the Palestinian National Authority born from those agreements.
However, the consensus reached by Israelis and Palestinians thanks to the formal and informal summits that took place between 1992 and 1993 in Madrid and Oslo remains the greatest advance towards peace in the region. Largely because it was signed by two of the main protagonists of the wars and guerrilla wars in which the conflict had been resolved for half a century: Rabin, a veteran of three Arab-Israeli wars and the commander in chief of the Defense Forces. of Israel, and Yasir Arafat, founder of Al Fatah and the Palestine Liberation Organization.
Both, together with the then Minister of Foreign Affairs of Israel, Shimon Peres, deserved the Nobel Peace Prize in 1994. The firm commitment that the internal agreements represented was well worth it. Because both Arafat and Rabin, as top representatives of the Palestinian Authority and the Israeli Government, had to deal with the strong internal opposition that their “concessions” to a historical enemy entailed. The desired consensus, furthermore, was marred by attacks and armed skirmishes that complicated a broad social consensus on both sides.
Hence, Rabin's Executive did not hesitate to take the agreements to the streets to support Israeli public opinion at a time when the conservative opposition considered them a capitulation to Palestinian terrorism. Some rabbis had defined government policy as heresy and in various demonstrations Rabin was represented as a Nazi SS officer or was directly compared to Hitler. He even went so far as to cry out for the death of the prime minister.
It was in this environment that Yitzhak Rabin addressed the public on November 4, 1995 in Tel Aviv at one of the marches in favor of the peace agreements to explain the needs of the agreement after decades of confrontation. When he came down from the stage where he gave the speech that we offer in full, a young ultra-Orthodox man, Yigal Amr, shot him at point-blank range.
“Let me tell you that I am deeply moved. I wish to thank each and every one of you who has come here today to take a stand against violence and for peace. This Government, which I have the privilege of leading, together with my friend Shimon Peres, has decided to give peace a chance, a peace that will solve most of Israel's problems.
”I was in the military for 27 years. I fought while there was no possibility of peace. I think that now there is that opportunity, a great opportunity. We must take advantage of it for the good of those who are here and for those who are not, who are many.
”I have always believed that the majority of the people want peace and are willing to take risks for peace. By coming here today, you demonstrate, along with many others who did not come, that the people truly desire peace and oppose violence.
”Violence erodes the foundations of Israeli democracy. It must be condemned and isolated. That is not the way of the state of Israel. In a democracy there may be differences, but the final decision will be made in democratic elections, like the 1992 elections, which gave us the mandate to do what we are doing and to continue on this path.
”I want to say that I am proud that you are here and that representatives of the countries with which we live in peace are here with us: Egypt, Jordan and Morocco, which paved the way for our peace. I want to thank the President of Egypt, the King of Jordan and the King of Morocco, represented here today, for their support on our path to peace.
”But above all, in the more than three years of this Government's mandate, I must thank the Israeli people for having shown that it is possible to make peace, to understand that peace opens the door to a better economy and society, that peace It's not just a wish. Peace is first and foremost in our prayers, but it is also the aspiration of the Jewish people, one of their genuine aspirations.
”There are enemies of peace who are trying to harm us to torpedo the process. I want to say bluntly that we have also found a partner for peace among the Palestinians: the PLO, which was an enemy and has stopped participating in terrorist acts.
”Without partners for peace there can be no peace. We will demand that they do their part for peace, just as we will do our part to resolve the most complicated, protracted and emotionally charged aspect of the Arab-Israeli conflict: the Palestinian-Israeli conflict.
”This is a path full of difficulties and pain. For Israel there is no path without pain. But the path of peace is preferable to the path of war. I say this as someone who was a soldier, someone who is today Minister of Defense and sees the pain of the families of Israeli soldiers. For them, for our children, in my case for our grandchildren, I want this Government to exhaust every opportunity to promote and achieve comprehensive peace. Even with Syria it will be possible to make peace.
”This demonstration must send a message to the Israeli people, to the Jewish people around the world, to the many peoples of the Arab world and, indeed, to the entire world, that the Israeli people want peace, they support it. For this I thank you.”
