JERUSALEM – Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu created the circumstances that led to the assassination of former Israeli PM Yitzhak Rabin, who was murdered in 1995, claimed former U.S. official Lawrence Wilkerson, who has reportedly advised Sen. Bernie Sanders’ presidential campaign.
Wilkerson made the statement during an interview earlier this month with The Real News Network, Breitbart Jerusalem has discovered.
He stated:
The current ultra-rightwing leadership in Israel under Bibi Netanyahu – to give a historical context – actually probably contributed to the tension and the incredible shift in political momentum in Israel that lead to the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin.
It’s not going too far to say that Netanyahu and his group created the circumstances that produced the assassin. This ended for all practical purposes, and other purposes too, the peace effort. The effort to build a two state, two viable stage, economically, financially, culturally, informationally, and so forth, in the region – Israel and Palestine. It ended it. There is no more peace process.
According to Wilkerson’s logic, by opposing Israeli negotiations with arch-terrorist Yasser Arafat, Netanyahu was complicit in the actions of Rabin’s assassin, Yigal Amir, a lone extremist who opposed the so-called peace process.
Wilkerson is not alone in this far-fetched view. Some members of the Israeli far-left have accused Netanyahu of not having done enough to oppose anti-Rabin incitement by some fringe elements of the movement against Israeli-Palestinian negotiations.
In February, Politico reported that Sanders is being advised by Wilkerson, a retired U.S. Army colonel who served as chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell and later became a staunch opponent of the war in Iraq.
“Of late, I’ve been asked by quite a number of people or groups to advise on national security and foreign policy. The Sanders campaign has been one of these and I have spoken directly to the senator on one occasion, at this point,” Wilkerson told Politico.
Since then, Wilkerson’s views have come under closer scrutiny, including his previous assertion, as Breitbart Jerusalem reported, that Israel may have carried out chemical attacks in Syria as a false-flag operation against the Bashar al-Assad regime.
The Sanders campaign did not respond to repeated Breitbart Jerusalem requests seeking comment about whether Wilkerson continues to advise the campaign.
Wilkerson has supported numerous conspiracy theories about Israel.
Last week, Breitbart Jerusalem reported that he claimed Israel “bombs” Lebanon to keep the country from competing with the Jewish state economically.
Also last week, Breitbart Jerusalem reported Wilkerson stated during a recent interview that Israeli behavior will see the Jewish state “eliminated by the international community if not the 350 to 400 million people around it who are opposed to it.”
He used the same interview to call for a total reassessment of the U.S. relationship with Israel, claiming that “Israel is becoming such a strategic liability for us, that it’s detrimental to our own national security.”
Without citing any specific evidence, Wilkerson espoused a conspiracy theory that Netanyahu has designs for a “greater Israel” that would encompass parts of Lebanon and Syria, and possibly all of Jordan.
In the interview, Wilkerson recognized that his words would probably ensure against his working in American politics in the future.
“The last time I spoke this way on your show, I compromised my ability to work for the Bernie Sanders campaign,” he said in his interview with The Real News Network.
He continued:
So now I’ve probably foreclosed my ability to work for anyone. It’s very hard to see how, at present pace, this situation is going to change, because the ultra-rightwing of Israel has captured AIPAC, and AIPAC has captured the United States Congress. And to a certain extent the oval office as well.
Aaron Klein is Breitbart’s Jerusalem bureau chief and senior investigative reporter. He is a New York Times bestselling author and hosts the popular weekend talk radio program, “Aaron Klein Investigative Radio.” Follow him on Twitter @AaronKleinShow. Follow him on Facebook.
With research by Brenda J. Elliott.
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