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The peace process ushered in by a handshake on the White House lawn between former Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Rabin and Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat had moments of genuine hope, punctuated by tragedy.

The US president joked that Golda Meir was the first Israeli PM he had met, and that Yitzhak Rabin, a successor, was there as an assistant.

Leaving aside that in 1995, shortly before the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin, Netanyahu led a mock funeral procession for the late prime minister, he currently has in his Cabinet two people who have themselves engaged in political violence.

He first became a national figure when Ben-Gvir famously broke a hood ornament off then-Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s car in 1995.

Itamar Ben-Gvir, Israel’s national security minister, had been convicted multiple times for supporting terrorist organizations and, in front of television cameras in 1995, vaguely threatened the life of Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin, who was murdered weeks later by an Israeli student.