    [Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: William J. Clinton (1995, Book II)]
    [November 6, 1995]
    [Pages 1723-1724]
    [From the U.S. Government Publishing Office www.gpo.gov]

    [[Page 1723]]

    Remarks at the Funeral of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in Jerusalem,
    Israel
    November 6, 1995

        Leah, to the Rabin children and grandchildren and other family
    members, President Weizman, Acting Prime Minister Peres, members of the
    Israeli Government and the Knesset, distinguished leaders from the
    Middle East and around the world, especially His Majesty King Hussein
    for those remarkable and wonderful comments and President Mubarak for
    taking this historic trip here, and to all the people of Israel.
        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.
        Leah, I know that too many times in the life of this country you
    were called upon to comfort and console the mothers and the fathers, the
    husbands and the wives, the sons and the daughters who lost their loved
    ones to violence and vengeance. You gave them strength. Now, we here,
    and millions of people all around the world, in all humility and honor,
    offer you our strength. May God comfort you among all the mourners of
    Zion and Jerusalem.
        Yitzhak Rabin lived the history of Israel. Through every trial and
    triumph, the struggle for independence, the wars for survival, the
    pursuit of peace--in all he served on the frontlines. This son of David
    and of Solomon took up arms to defend Israel's freedom and laid down his
    life to secure Israel's future.
        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-
    Gurion 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 2 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.
        To him, ceremonies and words were less important than actions and
    deeds. Six weeks ago, the King and President Mubarak will remember, we
    were at the White House for signing the Israel-Palestinian agreement.
    And a lot of people spoke. I spoke; the King spoke; Chairman Arafat
    spoke; President Mubarak spoke; our foreign ministers all spoke. And
    finally Prime Minister Rabin got up to speak, and he said, ``First, the
    good news: I am the last speaker.'' But he also understood the power of
    words and symbolism. ``Take a look at the stage,'' he said in
    Washington. ``The King of Jordan, the President of Egypt, Chairman
    Arafat, and us, the Prime Minister and Foreign Minister of Israel, on
    one platform. Please take a good, hard look. The sight you see before
    you was impossible, was unthinkable just 3 years ago. Only poets dreamt
    of it. And to our great pain, soldier and civilian went to their deaths
    to make this moment possible.'' Those were his words.
        Today, my fellow citizens of the world, I ask all of you to take a
    good, hard look at this picture. Look at the leaders from all over the
    Middle East and around the world who have journeyed here today for
    Yitzhak Rabin and for peace. Though we no longer hear his deep and
    booming voice, it is he who has brought us together again here in word
    and deed for peace.
        Now it falls to all of us who love peace and all of us who loved him
    to carry on the struggle to which he gave life and for which he gave his
    life. He cleared the path, and his spirit continues to light the way.
    His spirit lives on in the growing peace between Israel and her
    neighbors. It lives in the eyes of the children, the Jewish and the Arab
    children who are leaving behind a past of fear for a future of hope. It
    lives on in the promise of true security.
        So let me say to the people of Israel, even in your hour of
    darkness, his spirit lives on, and so you must not lose your spirit.
    Look at what you have accomplished: making a once barren desert bloom,
    building a thriving democracy in a hostile terrain, winning battles and
    wars and now winning the peace, which is the only enduring victory. Your
    Prime Minister was a martyr for peace, but he was a victim of hate.

    [[Page 1724]]

    Surely we must learn from his martyrdom that if people cannot let go of
    the hatred of their enemies, they risk sowing the seeds of hatred among
    themselves. I ask you, the people of Israel, on behalf of my Nation that
    knows its own long litany of loss, from Abraham Lincoln to President
    Kennedy to Martin Luther King, do not let that happen to you.
        In the Knesset, in your homes, in your places of worship, stay the
    righteous course. As Moses said to the children of Israel when he knew
    he would not cross over into the Promised Land, ``Be strong and of good
    courage, fear not for God will go with you. He will not fail you. He
    will not forsake you.'' President Weizman, Acting Prime Minister Peres,
    to all the people of Israel, as you stay the course of peace, I make
    this pledge: Neither will America forsake you.
        Legend has it that in every generation of Jews from time immemorial,
    a just leader emerged to protect his people and show them the way to
    safety. Prime Minister Rabin was such a leader. He knew as he declared
    to the world on the White House lawn 2 years ago that the time had come,
    in his words, ``to begin a new reckoning in the relations between
    people, between parents tired of war, between children who will not know
    war.'' Here in Jerusalem, I believe with perfect faiths that he was
    leading his people to that promised land.
        This week, Jews all around the world are studying the Torah portion
    in which God tests the faith of Abraham, patriarch of the Jews and the
    Arabs. He commands Abraham to sacrifice Yitzhak. ``Take your son, the
    one you love, Yitzhak.'' As we all know, as Abraham in loyalty to God
    was about to kill his son, God spared Yitzhak. Now, God tests our faith
    even more terribly, for he has taken our Yitzhak.
        But Israel's covenant with God, for freedom, for tolerance, for
    security, for peace, that covenant must hold. That covenant was Prime
    Minister Rabin's life's work. Now we must make it his lasting legacy.
    His spirit must live on in us.
        The Kaddish, the Jewish prayer for mourning, never speaks of death
    but often speaks of peace. In its closing words, may our hearts find a
    measure of comfort and our souls the eternal touch of hope: Oseh shalom
    bimromov hu ya'aseh shalom aleinu ve'al kol Yisrael, ve'imru amen. And
    shalom, chaver.

    Note: The President spoke at 2:24 p.m. at Har Herzl Cemetery. In his
    remarks, he referred to President Ezer Weizman and Acting Prime Minister
    Shimon Peres of Israel; King Hussein I of Jordan; President Hosni
    Mubarak of Egypt; and Chairman Yasser Arafat of the Palestinian
    Authority