NEWS Italy Commemorates Rabin. Eitan Haber to Speak in Rome

By Rossella Tercatin

Eitan Haber, Yitzhak Rabin’s spokesman, will be in Rome next Thursday to take part in an event commemorating the Israeli Prime Minister assassinated twenty years ago. The event, organized by the Union of Italian Jewish Communities and the Embassy of Israel in Rome, will feature a panel with journalists Antonio Polito (Corriere della Sera) and Anna Momigliano (Rivista Studio).

On November 4, 1995 Haber was given the devastating task of announcing to the world the death of a leader he had served and loved.

“Yitzhak, this is the final speech. There will be no others. For a generation, for more than 35 years, you were my guide, my leader, and like a second father to me,” Haber said pronouncing the eulogy at Rabin’s funeral. “Five minutes before the man who shot drew his gun, you sang ‘The Song of Peace’ from a music sheet which was handed to you in order, like you always said, not to mumble the words. Yitzhak, you know you had a thousand good qualities, a thousand advantages, you were great, yet singing was not your strong point. You faked the words just a little bit during the song and afterwards, folded the page into four equal parts, as always, and put it into your jacket pocket. In the hospital, after the doctors and nurses had cried, they handed me the paper which they found in your jacket pocket. Again, the page was folded into four equal parts, as always. Now, I want to read some of the words from the paper, but it is difficult for me. Your blood, your blood Yitzhak, covers the printed words. Your blood on the page of ‘The Song of Peace’.”

After Rabin’s death, Haber returned to his career as a journalist, writing for the Israeli daily Yediot Achronot and authoring a number of books.

The event, which will take place at the Pitigliani Jewish Center, comes after many initiatives to remember the prime minister all throughout Italy.