Yigal Amir
Yigal Amir (May 23rd, 1970 - ) is an Israeli right-wing extremist responsible for the assassination of Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin in Tel Aviv. He was motivated by his opposition to the terms of Rabin's peace treaty with Yasser Arafat.
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Early life edit
Amir was born in Herzliya to an Israeli Orthodox Yemenite Jewish family, one of eight children. His father Shlomo was a sofer who held a post supervising the kosher slaughtering of chickens and taught Shabbat lessons at a local synagogue. His mother Geula was a kindergarten teacher, and ran a nursery school in the family home's backyard.
Amir attended an Independent Education System school in Herzliya, and a high school yeshiva in Tel Aviv. He did his military service in the Israel Defense Forces as a Hesder student, combining army service in a religious platoon of the Golani Brigade with religious study at Yeshivat Kerem B'Yavneh. Despite being in a religious unit, even his comrades considered him a religious fanatic.
Following his military service, Amir was nominated by the religious-Zionist youth movement Bnei Akiva to teach Judaism in Riga, Latvia, as part of Nativ.
In 1993, Amir began studying at Bar-Ilan University as part of its kollel program, mixing religious and secular studies. Amir studied law and computer science, as well as Jewish law at the Institute for Advanced Torah Studies.
Amir was strongly opposed to the Oslo Accords. He participated in protest rallies against the accords on campus, was active in organising weekend bus outings to support Israeli settlers, and helped found an illegal settlement outpost. He was especially active in Hebron, where he led marches through the streets.
During his years as an activist, Amir became friendly with Avishai Raviv, to whom he revealed his plan to kill Rabin. While Raviv posed as a right-wing radical, he was working for Shin Bet, the Israeli internal security service. Some rightists have accused the Shin Bet of having orchestrated the assassination to discredit them.
In 1994, during his university studies, Amir met – and began a (non-sexual) relationship with – Nava Holtzman, a law student from an Orthodox Ashkenazi family. In January 1995, after five months, Holtzman ended the relationship after her parents objected due to Amir's Mizrahi background. She married one of his friends soon afterwards. Amir, who attended the wedding, went into a deep depression.
Assassination edit
On November 4th, 1995, Amir waited in a car park near where Rabin was talking to demonstrators protesting his treaty. As Rabin left, Amir stepped out and fired three shots at Rabin. Two of the bullets hit Rabin, and another wounded his bodyguard Yoram Rubin. Amir was immediately subdued by Rabin's bodyguards, whereas Rabin was rushed to a nearby hospital, where he died on the operating table after 40 minutes.
Trial edit
Amir and his two accomplices, Dror Adani and his brother Hagai, were put on trial for the assassination. Due to Amir's insistence that he was following the will of God, he was given a psychiatric evaluation, which determined that he was simply a fanatic, and not a maniac. Amir pleaded that the killing was in accordance with Jewish law, but was convicted and sentenced to life imprisonment, plus six years for wounding Rubin. He was also later sentenced to an additional eight years for conspiracy.
Despite life sentences in Israel generally being reduced to 20-30 years, president Moshe Katsav refused to reduce the sentence, saying that there is "no forgiveness, no absolution and no pardon" for Yigal Amir. Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and former prime minister Ehud Olmert have also both stated that Yigal Amir will never be released, and the Israeli government passed a law banning the release of those who kill prime ministers in December 2001.