4 November 2005, New York --
Citizen of the United States Stephen M. St. John calls to the attention of the international community,
members of the Congress of the USA and other individuals and organizations his unpublished article written six years ago for
the fourth-year anniversary of the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin. Citizen St. John regrets that his concerns about
incitement for the violent overthrow of the Rabin government, which emanated from within the USA, have been ignored for a
full decade now. And in this long interval the international community has witnessed right here in the USA other instances
of incitement to commit crimes of violence going unchecked even though they clearly violate the law. For example, the
New York Times published op-ed writer Thomas Friedman's 6 November 1997 call for a "Head Shot" for Saddam Hussein. And
earlier this year, there was televangelist Pat Robertson's call for the assassination of Venezuelan leader Hugo Chávez Frias.
And, of course, topping the list is the psychopathic Zionist Neo-Con incitement for public support of their unjustified, illegal
and immoral invasion and occupation of Iraq by means of lies about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq as well as the BIG
LIE about what actually happened on their "new Pearl Harbor" day of infamy, 11 September 2001. As the world community
remembers Yitzhak Rabin upon the passing of the 10th anniversary date of his death by assassination, leaders here in the USA
need either to dedicate or to rededicate themselves to the rule of law at home and abroad. Finally, Citizen St. John
invites readers to visit his web site, http://mysite.verizon.net/vze4wbps where, in the navigation bar under the heading PAT ROBERTSON: PART OF A REPUBLICAN MEAN STREAK, there is more information
on the topic of Rabin's assassination, including the above referenced article of 4 November 1999.
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[The unsolicited and unpublished 4 November 1999 article also appears right below.]
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OP-ED EDITOR, THE NEW YORK TIMES
4 November 1999
Four years after the assassination of Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin the full story of what really
happened remains to be told. The body of the warrior-turned-peacemaker was still warm when a number of rabbis came under
suspicion for having cited religious law necessitating the removal by violent force of a person such as Rabin who would
give away under any circumstances land that is "inalienably Jewish." And lately, an Israeli dirty tricks security
officer, said to have been tasked by the Rabin government to create embarrassing situations attributable to the right wing
opposition, is now on trial for failing to act to rein in one of his charges, the young man now in prison for Rabin's murder.
Here at home a missing piece to the assassination puzzle continues to be ignored by the proper authorities
for political reasons. An article in the JEWISH PRESS (3 November 1995, page 10) by Paul Eidelberg, which was on newsstands
in New York City and Jerusalem on the Wednesday before the Saturday when Rabin died, called for revolution and overthrow of
the Rabin government. A bit more subtle than the cursing rabbis who became the focus of immediate attention, Eidelberg
cited the Torah and the American Declaration of Independence as well as the musings of unnamed "respectable Israeli citizens"
as references for his justification of revolution by violent force "when the laws of the state violate the laws of G-d."
Six weeks before the assassination and publication of this actionable article, the JEWISH PRESS editors
removed the usual reference to Professor Eidelberg's association with Bar Ilan University from the headline of his weekly
column. Inasmuch as Eidelberg was on sabbatical in the USA in November 1995, why would the editors erase his connection
to this university? Rabin's murderer, we soon learned, once attended Bar Ilan.
Why do the proper authorities hold back? Appellate judges Newman, Leval and Parker, in the case of
Sheik Omar Abdul Rahman et al., spelled out the applicable law clearly: "Words of this nature -- ones that instruct,
solicit or persuade others to commit crimes of violence -- violate the law and may be properly prosecuted regardless
of whether they are uttered in private, or in a public speech, or in administering the duties of a religious ministry."
What, then, prevents Eidelberg's arrest? It may well be a desire to save Governor Pataki and Mayor
Giuliani deep embarrassment; Pataki was a regular contributor to the JEWISH PRESS at the time of Rabin's death and Giuliani
was riding a wave of editorial adulation for having ejected Yasir Arafat from a Lincoln Center concert just weeks before.
But for the governor and the mayor to go down in history as linked to an individual who incited for the death of Yitzhak Rabin
is simply too outrageous! What other explanation is there for the deep chill that has obviously been put on an investigation
and prosecution of Eidelberg?
The JEWISH PRESS is a right wing weekly newspaper that champions the idea of a purely Jewish state
over an integrated and democratic one. Writers, including KACH party members, have called for revival of the pre-Hitler
Zionist policy of "transfer" of Arabs to the east of the Jordan River. Correspondents have called Israeli elections
and Knesset votes fraudulent when Arab votes help decide the outcome. A contributing rabbi once declared informers against
other Jews anathema to the Jewish community, which is inconsistent with the adversarial process on which our legal system
is founded. For Pataki and Giuliani to lend the prestige of their high offices to such extremism is not only shameful
but also dangerous for democracy.
Indeed, Police Commissioner Howard Safir recently elevated the editorial board of the JEWISH PRESS to
the status of a pre-Grand Jury in the unfortunate death of a deranged person at the hands of the NYPD. Safir can hardly
be expected to be objective in holding one of its contributing writers accountable for his poisonous ink.
Surely, some ad hoc schmoozing did occur right after the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin; shortly thereafter,
the editors showed some damage control sensitivity by adding an extra caveat on top of the page where Eidelberg's regular
weekly column still appears: "Views expressed on this page are not necessarily those of the publisher." But this
does not wash away the innocent blood!
Stephen M. St. John, POB 449, NYC, NY 10185, Telefax 212 534 5024
Author, An Eight Part Peace Proposal for Greater Jerusalem
