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A DAY OF MOURNING
NOVEMBER 6, 1995
TRANSCRIPT
In Jerusalem, King Hussein of Jordan, President Clinton, and Acting Prime Minister Simon Peres speak at the funeral of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was assassinated on Saturday, November 4.
JIM LEHRER: Yitzhak Rabin was buried in Jerusalem today. The murdered Israeli prime minister was given full military honors at an emotional ceremony. He was lowered into a grave at the Mount Herzl National Cemetery, where the founder of modern Zionism, Theodore Herzl, was buried in 1949. More than 40 world leaders were there for the funeral, including President Clinton and former Presidents Bush and Carter. Arab leaders made an unprecedented appearance at the funeral of a Jewish head of state. King Hussein of Jordan and President Mubarak of Egypt paid tribute to Rabin's peacekeeping efforts. King Hussein was making his first appearance in Jerusalem since Israel captured it from Jordan in 1967. He had signed a peace treaty with Rabin after 46 years of fighting. He called his former enemy a brother.
KING HUSSEIN, Jordan: I have never thought that the moment would come like this when I would grieve the loss of a brother, a colleague, and a friend, a man, a soldier, who met us on the opposite side of a divide. You lived as a soldier. You died as a soldier for peace. And I believe it is time for all of us to come out openly and to speak our peace. Let our voices rise high to speak of our commitment to peace for all times to come. He had courage, he had vision, and he had a commitment to peace. And standing here, I commit before you, before my people in Jordan, before the world, myself to continue to do our utmost to ensure that we leave a similar legacy. And when my time comes, I hope it will be like my grandfather's and like Yitzhak Rabin's.
PRESIDENT CLINTON: The American people mourn with you in the loss of your leader, and I mourn with you, for he was my partner and friend. Every moment we shared was a joy, because he was a good man and an inspiration because he was also a great man. He was a man completely without pretense, as all of his friends knew. I read that in 1949 after the war of independence, David Ben Gurian sent him to represent Israel at the armistice talks at Rhodes, and he had never before worn a necktie and did not know how to tie the knot. So the problem was solved by a friend who tied it for him before he left and showed him how to preserve the knot simply by loosening the tie and pulling it over his head. Well, the last time we were together, not two weeks ago, he showed up for a black tie event on time but without the black tie, and so he borrowed a tie, and I was privileged to straighten it for him. It is a moment I will cherish as long as I live.
SHIMON PERES, Acting Prime Minister, Israel: (speaking through interpreter) I see our people very distressed, a nation with tears in their eyes. The world also knows that the man who murdered you will not be able to murder the idea that you carried. You left us a road that we will follow with instinct and faith. The nation cries tears of unity though and crying but of peace, peace with our neighbors. Good-bye my eldest brother, the bringer of peace. We will add and continue to carry this peace for near and far that you wanted and expected in your life and death.
EITAN HABER, Rabin Speech Writer: (speaking through interpreter) You were my father. Five minutes before you were shot you sang the song of peace from a piece of paper that they gave you in order that you should murmur the words, as you always said. Yitzhak, you know that you had thousands of advantages, but the songs and the singing were not your greatest strength. As always, you folded the paper into four equal parts and put it into your jacket pocket. In the hospital, after the doctors and nurses had cried, they gave me the paper they found in your jacket. It was folded, as always, into four equal parts, and I want to read some words from that paper, but it's difficult. Your blood, Yitzhak, your blood covers these typed words. This is the paper. "Let the sun rise to bring in the morning. Ever since the candle was extinguished, bitter crying will not bring it back. No one will return is from the deep and dark void, no words of praise. Only sing a song of peace and sing it well with a great cry." Yitzhak, we already miss you.politic
JIM LEHRER: Yasser Arafat, the chairman of the Palestine Liberation Organization, did not attend the funeral. He watched it on television instead from his office in Gaza City. He cited political and security reasons for not going to Jerusalem. The Palestinian authority was represented by a delegation of six ministers. The 25-year-old law student who confessed to Rabin's murder appeared in a Tel Aviv court today. Yigal Amir told a magistrate he killed the Israeli leader because Rabin wanted to "give our country to the Arabs." He said, "I did this to stop the peace process." Amir was ordered held for 15 days pending formal charges. His brother has also been arrested. Police said Hagai Amir prepared one of the bullets used in the attack. Still to come on the NewsHour tonight, how could this happen in Israel, what does it mean for peace, and who was Yitzhak Rabin?
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