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Thousands of people were expected Saturday evening in Tel Aviv's Rabin Square at the annual memorial rally for slain prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, badbadinated at a similar rally on November 4, 1995.
Saturday's event, which begins at 7:30 pm, Tzachi Hanegbi (Likud), opposition leader Tzipi Livni (Zionist Union), Yesh Atid leader Yair Lapid, Zionist Union Chief Avi Gabbay and Meretz Chief Tamar Zandberg. Several political and social activists will also speak and perform artists.
For the second year in a row the rally is being organized by the darkness movement, which describes itself as a group seeking to "empower the moderate majority of Israelis to exert influence on government policy and the public discourse."
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The organization said ahead of the rally that it would "focus this year on warning against an atmosphere of divisiveness, incitement and inflamed spirits ahead of the general future elections."
Noting the "violent and incendiary public discourse" has been prevalent ahead of Rabin's killing 23 years ago, the group said that it would be called upon to "maintain a civilized rhetoric."
Ahead of the rally roads around the square were closed off at 5:30 pm Streets were expected to reopen around 11 p.m.
Regional Cooperation Minister Tzachi Hanegbi Speaks at the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations at the Inbal Hotel in Jerusalem, February 19, 2018 (Yonatan Sindel / Flash90)
Events to commemorate Rabin's badbadination has already been divisive this year. Rabin's granddaughter Noah Rothman, speaking at a national memorial ceremony last month, said Israel's leadership was setting the country's political camps against each other and inciting against the left. She also erroneously claimed that the Prime Minister's Office had been branded her grandfather a "traitor."
Her speech was lambasted by various right-wing politicians as "political" in nature, leading to scathing retorts from left-wing leaders.
President Reuven Rivlin also commented on the fact that the prime minister is one of the prime ministers of crime in the Israeli society, and warned of the dangers of incitement to violence.
Right-wing extremist Yigal Amir shot Rabin to death on November 4, 1995, at the end of an event held in Tel Aviv to make public support for his efforts to make peace with the Palestinians. Rabin served as Israel's chief of staff during the Six Day War in 1967. Other posts that he held during his career included ambbadador to the US, defense minister and prime minister.
In 1994, he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize along with then-foreign minister Shimon Peres and PLO Chairman Ybader Arafat for his part in signing the Oslo Peace Agreements.
Raoul Wootliff contributed to this report.
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