A
Voice
For
Leah Rabin
addressed a
packed sanctu-
ary at Temple
Israel.
ce
Leah Rabin reiterates her pro peace
and anti-Orthodox stances during
her visit to Temple Israel.
ALAN HITSKY
Interim Editor
"Our Shabbat is our Shabbat. Our
holidays are our holidays. We feel 150
percent Jewish," she told the approv-
ing .crowd. "How we live our Jewish
life is each individual's priority. You
need to let your voices be heard."
The remaining questions dealt with
the peace process. Mrs. Rabin down-
played reports about Palestinian chair-
hen Leah Rabin spoke
on Sunday, 1,000 people
in Temple Israel's sanc-
tuary listened politely.
But when the widow of slain Israeli
Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin began
answering questions from
the audience, the crowd
grew animated and she visi-
bly relaxed.
Mrs. Rabin's 30-minute
speech looked back at the
Middle East peace process,
the successes in negotiating
with the Palestinians and
the political events in Israel
leading up to her husband's
murder two years ago.
Airs. Rabin
She gave a stinging
,intognzpimei
rebuke to Orthodox Jewish
cotyies 1 , ' her
factions, who she blames in
part for her husband's mur-
der. "You [Reform and
Conservative Jews] are the
man Yassir Arafat's poor health. She
majority, the strong part of Judaism in
said her husband had tried to find
the United States.
another Palestinian leader for the
"If the Orthodox don't recognize
peace process "but found there was
you, that's too bad. They are the
only one Yassir Arafat. He has enor-
minority in the U.S. and the minority
mous standing among his people ...
in Israel."
just give them a chance."
She said the Orthodox are trying to
Giving the Palestinians a chance to
control Jewish life in Israel and "it will
make peace was a common thread
never happen.
during Mrs. Rabin's appearance at
Temple Israel. She expressed the belief
that autonomy would lead to a
Palestinian statehood that should not
be feared by Israelis.
"We deterred Egypt and Syria three
times [in war]. So what if the
Palestinians say they want Tel Aviv.
They won't have a strong army. The
Palestinians will destroy
our country? What non-
sense! Egypt couldn't.
Syria couldn't. So a few
Palestinians with rifles
will?"
But on the issue of
Jerusalem, Mrs. Rabin
was unbending, saying
flatly that there would be
no partition of the Jewish
capital.
"Jerusalem is the
strongest Jewish symbol
for Jews throughout the
world," she said. While
there have been discus-
sions about returning the
Golan Heights and parts of Judea and
Samaria in exchange for a true peace,
'we never said we'd give up Jerusalem.
Once it was reunited, we would never
divide it again."
During the 1995 election campaign
in Israel, opponents accused Yitzhak
Rabin of planning to divide the city.
"It was a vicious lie," Mrs. Rabin said.
"Yitzhak fought for Jerusalem in 1948
and again in 1967. He would never
divide it."
She suggested that an undivided
Jerusalem could serve as the capital of
both Israel and the future Palestinian
state.
Asked what she would say to
Americans who are afraid of visiting
Israel, Mrs. Rabin quipped, "Are the&
such?" She said visitors and Israelis
have more to fear from Israel's danger-
ous highways than from terrorism.
"You have to be a fatalist," she said.
"There is trouble in Paris, in Egypt,
everywhere."
In response to one of the final
questions, Mrs. Rabin again chastised
the Orthodox in Israel. She said the
Labor and Likud political factions a
could get along "if the Orthodox
were not involved in politics. They
are increasing their presence with lots
of money."
Then she drew laughter from her
audience when she asked, "Do you
think now I can go back to Israel?"
Mrs. Rabin's appearance was part
of Temple Israel's annual speaker's
forum. She spoke at earlier events •
during the day Sunday and auto-
graphed copies of her book, Rabin:
Our Life, His Legacy. A photographic
exhibit featuring Yitzhak Rabin is on
display in the Temple atrium through
Dec. 15. El