Israelis protest at court decision on Rabin's killer

More than 100,000 Israelis gathered in the square where their prime minister Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated 12 years ago to remember him – and protest against a decision to allow the assassin to be present at his son’s circumcision today.

The decision means killer Yigal Amir will attend the event on the anniversary of Rabin’s murder.

Crowds filled Rabin Square in Tel Aviv and spilled over into the surrounding streets last night, some carrying signs and banners calling for peace and tolerance.

The square in front of Tel Aviv city hall was the site of a peace rally on November 4 1995 where Rabin was gunned down by Amir an Orthodox Jewish ultra-nationalist opposed to his policy of trading land with the Palestinians for peace.

Last night’s rally opened with film footage of Rabin addressing the 1995 rally, thanking participants for coming out to support the theme “No to violence, yes to peace”.

Amir, who is serving a life sentence, is held in isolation, but has been permitted conjugal visits over the past year with his wife, Larissa Trimbobler, whom he married by proxy while in prison. They had a son a week ago.

A court rejected Amir’s request to attend a ceremony outside the prison, but said it could take place within the prison walls, a decision that outraged Israelis.

“This is a memorial rally that is also a protest rally,” Rabin’s daughter, Dalia Rabin-Pelossof, said before last night’s gathering.

The birth comes at a time of growing sympathy for commuting Amir’s sentence.

Israeli extremists and Amir’s family have launched a campaign to have him released from prison and a recent newspaper poll indicated that about a quarter of Israelis, including almost half of religiously-observant Jews, think Amir should be pardoned in 2015 after serving 20 years.

Any clemency would be granted by Israel’s president. But President Shimon Peres, who was Rabin’s foreign minister and just a few steps away when he was gunned down, has said Amir should not be pardoned.

Peres did not address the matter directly last night, instead encouraging the crowd to fulfil Rabin’s legacy and push the path to peace.

Defence minister Ehud Barak, a former prime minister, said: “The despicable murderer does not deserve to be remembered tonight.

“I will only say this: his punishment will not be commuted and the prison gates will shut him in until his final days.”

Rabin’s government negotiated the first interim peace accord with the Palestinians and he won a Nobel Peace Prize for his efforts.