Manes was at 1995 peace rally at which Rabin was shot

Older man beaten for removing banner supporting Rabin’s killer, suffers brain bleed

Still no arrests a week after Ilan Manes, a former lieutenant colonel in the IDF, was assaulted by a gang of youths on camera near Mevasseret Zion

Assailants assault a 75-year-old man for taking down a banner calling for the release of Yigal Amir, the far-right assassin who killed Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995, on July 28, 2026. (Screenshots/Social media, used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)
Assailants assault a 75-year-old man for taking down a banner calling for the release of Yigal Amir, the far-right assassin who killed Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995, on July 28, 2026. (Screenshots/Social media, used in accordance with Clause 27a of the Copyright Law)

A 75-year-old man has been hospitalized with a brain hemorrhage after he was assaulted last week for taking down a banner that called for the release of Yigal Amir, the far-right activist who assassinated prime minister Yitzhak Rabin in 1995, the hospitalized man’s family and lawyers said.

Footage from the assault on Ilan Manes last Tuesday showed several youths — reportedly right-wing extremists — dragging and kicking him after he removed the sign at the Hemed Intersection on Route 1, near his home in Mevasseret Zion, just west of Jerusalem.

Manes filed a complaint with police, but almost a week later, no one has been arrested over the assault, according to the Protest Detainee Legal Support Front, a group of lawyers who offer pro bono services to anti-government protesters.

According to the group, Manes found his left hand to be unresponsive while he was working at home on Thursday, two days after the assault. The same thing happened again, “even more seriously,” on Saturday, at which point his family took him to Jerusalem’s Hadassah Ein Kerem hospital.

He was expected to undergo brain surgery at the hospital on Monday night, his daughter Talia told Army Radio.

She said he was responsive, but “lost consciousness several times yesterday.”

“He couldn’t deal with the sign,” his daughter said, referring to the banner over Route 1.

“He understood he was getting into some kind of confrontation, but he didn’t imagine it would end like this,” she said.

Talia noted that her father, a former lieutenant colonel in the Israel Defense Forces, had been present at the Tel Aviv peace rally at which Rabin spoke shortly before he was gunned down on November 4, 1995.

A banner declaring that Yigal Amir, who assassinated prime minister Yitzhak Rabin, ‘will be released,’ is seen on a bridge over the Route 1 highway between Jerusalem and Tel Aviv on July 26, 2026. (Times of Israel)

Amir, an extremist Jew who opposed the 1993 Oslo Accords under which Israel was transferring West Bank territory to Palestinian control, assassinated Rabin.

Amir claimed religious legitimacy for the murder. He has said he was prompted by the 1992 election results that brought the Labor leader to power, and that he was encouraged to do so by the massacre of 29 Palestinians by Jewish terrorist Baruch Goldstein in Hebron in 1994.

The mass peace rally at which Rabin was shot was called to highlight opposition to violence and to showcase public support for Rabin’s efforts to negotiate with the Palestinians.

Recent years have seen an increase in the number of calls for the release of Amir.

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