Rehavam Ze'evi

(Hebrew: רחבעם "גנדי" זאבי, born 20 June 1926, died 17 October 2001) was an Israeli general, politician and historian who founded the right-wing nationalist Moledet party. He was assassinated by Hamdi Quran of the Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP). Ze'evi was an advocate of population transfer.

Biography

Rehavam Ze'evi was born in 1926 in Jerusalem. He joined the Palmach in 1942, and served in the Israeli Defence Forces after the creation of the State of Israel. During his youth, Ze'evi went to school in Givat HaShlosha. One night he shaved his head, wrapped a towel round his waist and entered the food hall. The similarity to Mohandas Gandhi earned him Gandhi as his nickname, which stuck with him for the rest of his life. The nickname is also attributed to a long Arab dress he wore during his underground days in Palmach.Ze'evi had five children, Palmach, Sayar, Masada, Tze'ela and Arava. Palmach is also a member of Moledet and competed with Binyamin Elon for the party's leadership.

Military career

In 1948, Rehavam Ze'evi was a platoon commander in the IDF. In 1964-1968, he served as Chief of the Department of Staff in the Israeli General staff. In the late 1960s, Ze'evi formed the elite Sayeret Kharuv, an anti-terror battalion, at the time when IDF Chief of Staff Haim Bar-Lev had begun to focus IDF manpower and budget on armoured tank units, resulting in huge cutbacks in infantry forces. Over the next five years he served as the Commander of the Central Military District (Hebrew: אלוף פיקוד המרכז). He retired in September 1973, but rejoined the army when the Yom Kippur Warbroke out on October 6, 1973. A close friend of IDF Chief of Staff David Elazar, he was appointed Special Assistant to the Chief of Staff. He retired with the rank of major-general (אלוף) in 1974.

Ze'evi, known for his concern for Israel's captured or missing soldiers, wore a military identity disc with their names on his neck.

Political career

In 1974 he became Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin's consultant on combating terrorism. The following year he became the prime minister's adviser on matters of intelligence. Ze'evi resigned from this position in 1977, when Likud's Menachem Begin became prime minister. In 1988, Ze'evi established the Moledet (Homeland) party advocating the population transfer of Arabs from Judea and Samaria (West Bank) and the Gaza Strip to the neighboring Arab countries.

After the Madrid Conference of 1991, Ze'evi withdrew from the Likud government of Yitzhak Shamir, remaining in the opposition for a decade. He disagreed strongly with the Labour governments of 1992-1996 (led by Yitzhak Rabin and Shimon Peres) and 1999-2001 (Ehud Barak), however, he looked favourably on the Netanyahu government of 1996-1999 and supported it from the outside.

In 1999, Moledet united with Herut – The National Movement and Tkuma into a single faction — the National Union. Following the election of Ariel Sharon in February 2001, Ze'evi joined the coalition and was appointed Tourism Minister of Israel.

Eretz Yisrael Museum

In 1981, Ze'evi was appointed director of the Eretz Israel Museum in Tel-Aviv. In 1987, he co-edited a series of books describing various aspects of the Land of Israel, based on artifacts from the museum. Ze'evi was famous for having one the largest collection of books about Israel and its history.

Assassination

Ze'evi was shot in the Jerusalem Hyatt hotel on Mount Scopus on October 17, 2001 by four gunmen. He was taken to the Hadassah Medical Center hospital where he died before 10 a.m. The Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine took credit for the killing and stated that it was in revenge for the assassination of their secretary-general Abu Ali Mustafa, killed by Israel in August that year. Israel alleges that Ahmed Saadat ordered Ze'evi's assassination. Thousands took part in his funeral.The four gunmen, Hamdi Quran, Basel al-Asmar, Majdi Rahima Rimawi, and Ahad Olma, fled to the Palestinian National Authority. Israel placed Yasser Arafat under siege in the Ramallah compound to force the handing over of the suspects. In April 2002 the US brokered a plan where the suspects were to be jailed in Jericho instead. The four killers were arrested together with the head of Popular Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), Ahmad Sa'adat. They were imprisoned in a jail in Jericho and guarded by American and British forces. On March 14, 2006, the American and British guards left the jail, charging that the Palestininan Authority was not adhering to the agreement reached with Israel. Israel then launched Operation Bringing Home the Goods, in which it raided the Jericho prison and seized the five.

In December 2007, Hamdi Quran confessed in an Israeli court to assassinating Ze'evi together with Basel al-Asmar after being instructed by PFLP member Majdi Rahima Rimawi. He was sentenced to 125 years in prison.

In August 2007 Basel al-Asmar was convicted of murder by an Israeli court. In May 2008, he was sentenced to 45 years in prison.

In July 2008, Majdi Rahima Rimawi was convicted of murder by an Israeli court for his part in planning the assassination. According to the verdict, Rehima was the one who supplied the gunmen with a photo of Ze'evi, details of the hotel in which he would be staying and information on the hotel layout. He was sentenced to life in prison and an additional 80 years.

In December 2008, Ahad Olma, head of the PLFP's military wing at the time of the assassination, was sentenced to 30 years in prison for his role in instigating and planning the assassination.

In December 2008, an Israeli military court sentenced Ahmad Sa'adat, leader of the Palestinian Front for the Liberation of Palestine (PFLP), to 30 years in prison for heading an "illegal terrorist organization" and for his responsibility for all actions carried out by his organization.

Political views

Ze'evi advocated the population transfer by agreement of 3.3 million residents of the West Bank and Gaza to Arab nations. He believed this could be accomplished by making life difficult, so they would relocate on their own, through use of military force during wartime, or by agreement with Arab nations. In July 1987, Ze'evi presented his ideas at a forum in Tel Aviv, describing the plan as a voluntary transfer and the only way to make peace with the Arabs. After the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait in 1990, Ze'evi proposed transferring Palestinians to the east side of the Jordan River to serve as a buffer zone against any Iraqi attempt to attack Israel.

In a radio interview in July 2001, Ze'evi stated that 180,000 Palestinians worked and lived illegally in Israel. He described them as a "cancer," and said Israel should rid itself of those who were not Israeli citizens "the same way you get rid of lice."He called for denying the vote to Arab citizens who did not serve in the army. He believed that Jordan historically historically belonged to the Tribes of Israel - Gad, Reuven, and Menashe Zeevi urged Israeli Prime Minister Ariel Sharon to "lay waste to the Palestinian Authority" and assassinate PLO leader Yasser Arafat.

Binyamin Elon, leader of the Moledet party after Ze'evi's murder, maintains that Ze'evi did not hate Arabs.

A few days after the Six Day War, Ze'evi submitted a plan for the creation of a Palestinian state called the State of Ishmael, with Nablus as its capital.He urged Israel's leaders to establish this state as soon as possible, claiming that: "Protracted Israeli military rule will expand the hate and the abyss between the residents of the West Bank and Israel, due to the objective steps that will have to be taken in order to ensure order and security."

Controversy

Highway 90 renamed Derekh Gandi

In 1975, Ehud Olmert, later Prime Minister of Israel, accused Ze'evi of protecting organized crime figures. Ze'evi sued Olmert for libel but lost the case. In September 1991, while he serving as Minister without Portfolio, he called US President George H. W. Bush an "anti-Semite." In 1997 he called US Ambassador to Israel, Martin Indyk a "Jewboy" and challenged him to a fistfight.

Legacy and commemoration

In July 2005, the Knesset passed a law to commemorate Ze'evi's memory. Route 90 was renamed Gandhi Road in his honor. Eilat's promenade was named for him. The communal settlement of Merhav Am and the West Bank settlement Ma'ale Rehav'am also bear his name.

See also

• Arab-Israeli conflict
• History of Israel
• Israel Defense Forces
• Israeli-Palestinian conflict
• List of assassinated people
• Palestinian political violence
• Politics of Israel
• Zionism
• Israeli casualties of war

External links

• PM Ariel Sharon's remarks on the 3rd Anniversary of the Assassination of Minister Rehavam Ze'evi z"l an address before the Knesset on 19 October 2004
• Knesset commemorates Ze'evi The Jerusalem Post, 2 November 2005
• Guestbook in Memory of Rehavam Ze'evi Knesset website