UN Secretary-General, Ban Ki-Moon, has urged UN member states to stand firm against violence and incitement.
He also charged them to be guided by late Israeli Prime Minister, Yitzhak Rabin’s realisation that the path to true security and strength was through dialogue and compromise.
Ban made the call in a message on Wednesday in New York on the 20th anniversary of the assassination of Rabin.
He offered his ‘’deepest sympathies’’ to the citizens of the Israel as they commemorated the life of a heroic man of peace, saying that Rabin dedicated his life to the security of his homeland.
The UN Chief said that Rabin died after courageously seizing on the need and the opportunity to embark on serious peace negotiations with the Palestinians.
According to him, Rabin recognised that as he said, you don’t make peace with friends; you can only make peace with your enemies.
He said that the late premier was ‘’vilified by many for that move, and murdered by an opponent of the peace process just when it was at a moment of historic breakthrough’’.
In the years since, Ban recalled, terrorism, expanding settlements and halting progress in implementing Israeli-Palestinian agreements had repeatedly shattered hopes.
‘’Today, the voices of the majority who support peace and oppose violence are being drowned out by inflammatory rhetoric and shocking actions by extremists on all sides,’’ he lamented.
