READING GUIDE By Author Itamar Rabinovich
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CONTENTS
Timeline
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Discussion Questions
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Primary/Secondary Sources
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About Jewish Lives
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TIMELINE 1922 1941 1947/8 1949–1964
Yitzhak Rabin is born in Jerusalem.
Yitzhak Rabin graduates from the Kedourie School and joins the military force of pre-state Israel. Rabin, by now senior officer in the Palmach, the elite unit of pre-state Israel and the IDF, participates in Israel’s War of Independence. As a brigade commander he fights on the road to Jerusalem and in Jerusalem, and then acts as a senior military planner in the center and the south of the country. Rabin remains in the IDF and plays an important role in building it up. In January 1964 he is appointed Chief of Staff of the IDF.
1964–1967
Arab-Israeli tensions rise to the point of creating the crisis of May 1967 that leads to the Six-Day War in June 1967. Rabin as Chief of Staff and Moshe Dayan as Minister of Defense lead the IDF.
1968
Rabin retires from the IDF and is appointed ambassador to Washington.
1968–1973
Rabin is an influential ambassador in Washington working closely with Henry Kissinger, the U.S. national security advisor.
1973
Rabin returns to Israel and joins politics through the Labor party. In the aftermath of the October War he is elected to the Knesset and becomes Minister of Labor in Golda Meir’s cabinet.
1974–1977
Golda Meir has to resign due to the setback of the October War. Rabin is elected to replace her. During his first term his main achievements are reconstruction of the Israeli economy and the IDF and the interim agreement with Egypt that paves the way to the 1979 Peace Treaty.
1977–1984 1984–1990 1992 1992 – 1995
Having had to resign in 1977, Rabin finds himself in the “political desert.” Rabin finds a modus vivendi with his party rival, Shimon Peres. Both participate with the Likud in national unity governments. Rabin serves through this period as Minister of Defense and rebuilds his position. After several attempts, Rabin defeats Peres in the Labor party’s primaries and wins the parliamentary elections to start his second term as prime minister. During his second term, Rabin launches a major effort to settle Israel’s relationship with its Arab neighbors. He signs the Oslo Accord with the PLO and a peace treaty with Jordan. A major shift occurs in Arab-Israeli relations. In November 1995, Rabin is assassinated by a right-wing fanatic. 3
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS TO OPEN THE CONVERSATION, BEGIN BY ASKING: 1. How did you like the book? Was there anything unexpected? 2. How, if at all, did Rabin’s Jewishness serve to set the course of his achievements? 3. How did Rabin’s relationship to the Jewish people and Judaism change over his lifetime? 4. Should Rabin be considered a Jewish Hero?
CHAPTER 1 1. Assess the impact of Rabin’s mother on his character. 2. To what extent were Rabin’s early years typical of his generation? 3. Explain Rabin’s swift success in his military career. 4. What was the impact of Israel’s War of Independence on Rabin’s life and subsequent career?
CHAPTER 2 1. What was Rabin’s role in building the IDF? 2. What was Rabin’s relationship with David Ben Gurion, Yigal Alon, Moshe Dayan, and Shimon Peres? 3. What were Rabin’s achievements and failures during the period leading to the Six-Day War?
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DISCUSSION QUESTIONS CHAPTER 3 1. What made Rabin an exceptional ambassador in Washington? 2. Characterize Rabin’s relationship with Henry Kissinger. 3. How did the Washington years shape Rabin’s outlook in his subsequent career?
CHAPTER 4 1. “Policy success, political failure.” Is this a good way of describing Rabin’s first tenure as prime minister? 2. To what extent did Rabin during his first tenure live and act in the shadow of Golda Meir? 3. To what extent did the interim agreement with Egypt pave the way to the 1979 peace treaty? 4. Was Rabin to blame for Labor’s electoral defeat in 1977?
CHAPTER 5 1. Explain Rabin’s unusual recovery and his ability to return to the prime minister’s office after 15 years. 2. How did Rabin become “Mr. National Security?” 3. To what extents can the roots of the Oslo Accord be traced to the 1980s?
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DISCUSSION QUESTIONS CHAPTER 6 1. Why did Rabin prefer the Syrian option over the Palestinian one? 2. Given that, how can the signing of the Oslo Accord be explained? 3. What was Rabin’s vision of a final status agreement with the Palestinians?
CHAPTER 7 1. Did Rabin and Peres have a genuine reconciliation? 2. Explain Yigal Amir’s success in killing Rabin. 3. Did Amir kill the peace process?
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SOURCES PRIMARY SOURCES Yitzhak Rabin, The Rabin Memoirs. Little Brown and Company, 1979. SECONDARY SOURCES Yossi Goldstein, Rabin: A Biography. Schocken, 2006. [in Hebrew] Slater, Robert, and Daniella Maor. Rabin, 20 Years After: The Biography. KIP-Kotarim International Publishing, 2015. Yoram Peri, The Assassination of Yitzhak Rabin. Stanford University Press, 2000.
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Jewish Lives is a prizewinning series of interpretative biography designed to illuminate the imprint of Jewish figures upon literature, religion, philosophy, politics, cultural and economic life, and the arts and sciences. Subjects are paired with authors to elicit lively, deeply informed books that explore the range and depth of the Jewish experience from antiquity to the present. Jewish Lives is a partnership of Yale University Press and the Leon D. Black Foundation. Ileene Smith is editorial director. Anita Shapira and Steven J. Zipperstein are series editors. For curated collections and special offers, visit www.JewishLives.org.
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