Middle East: The monument to slain Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in the Tel Aviv square where he was gunned down eight years ago was vandalised yesterday, ahead of the annual memorial ceremony tonight to mark his assassination by a religious Jewish extremist, writes Peter Hirschberg in Jerusalem
The spray-painting of swastikas on the monument, as well as extremist right-wing slogans on a huge banner picture of Mr Rabin erected in the square for the commemorative event, drew swift condemnation from across the political spectrum. But it also rekindled the contention that the atmosphere of rightist-led incitement at the time of the murder eight years ago contributed to Mr Rabin's death - and that it has re-emerged in recent weeks.
The slogan "Kahane was right" was daubed in black on the huge picture of Mr Rabin - a reference to the founder of the extremist Kach movement, Rabbi Meir Kahane, who was also gunned down, 12 years ago in New York, and who advocated transfer of the Palestinians out of the West Bank and Gaza.
Prime Minister Ariel Sharon called Mr Rabin's daughter, Ms Dalia Rabin-Pelossof, to express his shock over the vandalism. President Moshe Katsav called for the perpetrators to be brought to justice and urged the public to attend tonight's ceremony, in the square where the assassination took place on November 4th, 1995, and which has since been renamed Rabin Square.
But Labour Party leader Shimon Peres reinvoked the incitement allegation, saying the vandalism was an indication that extremists were interpreting recent comments by right-wing politicians as a licence to act. Mr Peres was referring to an ongoing, persistent attack by the right on a group of left-wing leaders who two weeks ago published an unofficial peace document drawn up with a group of prominent Palestinians, known as the Geneva Accord.
One right-wing politician said the group was guilty of treason, a capital crime, and a second called the group's leader, Oslo architect Mr Yossi Beilin, "an enemy collaborator". But it was Mr Sharon who set the tone when he accused the group of working with the enemy to undermine the government.
Politicians on the left immediately accused Mr Sharon and his government colleagues of engaging in the type of incitement that was directed towards Mr Rabin, who was repeatedly labelled a traitor by the right and by settler leaders after embarking on the Oslo process in 1993.
Even though the three-year-old Intifada has hardened much of Israeli society against the Palestinians and increased political support for the right, eight years on, the acrimony between left and right over the circumstances surrounding Mr Rabin's death, and the consequences it wrought, still lingers.
The left still contends that when the assassin, Yigal Amir, pumped two slugs into Mr Rabin's back from close range as the prime minister left a peace rally, he was not acting alone. That the frenzied settler-led demonstrations, in which protesters often carried placards with a rifle target imprinted on the face of Mr Rabin, and sometimes burned them, created an atmosphere in which Amir believed it was legitimate to do what he did.
Right-wing leaders dismiss the argument, insisting the assassin acted alone and that they have been the target of a smear campaign by the left.
With the Intifada still raging, the debate this year on the eve of the anniversary of the assassination has raised the inevitable, and ultimately unanswerable, "what if" questions. If Mr Rabin had been alive, some on the left argue, the blood-letting of the last three years would never have happened. The assassin, they say, changed the course of history.
The right counters that it was Mr Rabin's policies - withdrawal from large tracts of the West Bank and the arming of the Palestinian security forces - that resulted in the bloodshed and the deaths of so many Israelis.