“Words Do Kill”: Son of Assassinated Israeli Politician Yitzhak Rabin Sounds Alarm On Trump's Rhetoric

Yuval Rabin: “Politicians Have To Exercise Restraint And Know Where The Line Must Not Be Crossed”

From the August 16 edition of CNN's New Day:

Video file

YUVAL RABIN: To reflect my sense, living about a third of my life over 20 years, was the sense of a lost opportunity with a sense that I was the -- I saw what's happening and failed to take action. And I think I'm expressing the view of many Israelis that felt very similarly in the aftermath of my father's assassination. I saw the progression of things in the U.S. campaign, latest campaign, and saw the analogies and eventually I felt that I cannot stay silent any longer and want to raise the flag and the warning light that things, where do things ending in a situation like this? The atmosphere is toxic, as you mentioned, and I think it was my responsibility to sound the bell, ring the bell to at least bring the discussion to the -- to raise the discussion, like others did. 

CHRIS CUOMO (HOST) : And what is that discussion, Yuval? What do you want people to see in the words of Donald Trump? Those who see it as just hot headed political talk and the nature of a campaign. What do you see that's worse than that? 

RABIN: I want to make things very clear. I think the debate is very legitimate. It can be fierce, it can be tough. There's no question that the election season brings up a debate and about expressions are being made. But I think, as I’d like to say, words do kill and the politicians have to exercise restraint and know where the line must not be crossed. Especially when you have, and I think this is quite a similar situation, where you have a divided nation, where you have people feeling that one side is totally wrong and the others feel the other side is very wrong. This contentious times had required the restraint of the politicians in order not to result to incitement and personal denigrations. And I will stick to our example. We saw this and it wasn't just a matter of days or weeks. It was an ongoing campaign where my father was depicted as a murderer, as a Nazi, as a -- many other despicable ways that eventually led an intelligent, capable, ideologically motivated person to take an action. And he felt that he had all the legitimacy in the world to do the action that he did. 

[...]

America has known political assassinations, and quite a few of them, and I think it's only natural that people should be alarmed when unfounded, unreasonable allegations are trying to shut them.

Related:

USA TodayYuval Rabin: My Father Was Killed At A Moment Like This

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