Rabin killer’s brother doesn’t regret anti-Rivlin post

The brother of Yitzhak Rabin assassin Yigal Amir said he had no regret Wednesday for a Facebook post wishing death on President Reuven Rivlin, as a judge sent him to house arrest.

Hagai Amir, who served 16 years in prison for helping to plan and carry out the murder of former prime minister Rabin, was arrested Tuesday after writing on Facebook that God would punish Rivlin.

The post came in response to a statement from Rivlin on the 20th anniversary of the assassination that he would never pardon Hagai Amir’s younger brother Yigal.

“He does not determine whether my brother goes free or not, only God does, just as He determined that Rabin would die even though Rivlin and his friends didn’t exactly agree. He determined that Rivlin would be president, and the time will come when he will determine that Rivlin, along with the Zionist state, must depart from this world, just like Sodom did, for the crimes that it has committed against its people within the framework of the law,” Hagai Amir wrote on Facebook.

A Tel Aviv Magistrate’s Court judge sent Amir to house arrest until November 8 over his Facebook post, saying he posed a “public threat.” Amir posted a NIS 20,000 ($5,100) bond.

“Given the state’s painful experience in the past regarding threats against elected officials, there is a public threat to which there is no alternative to detention,” Judge Yaron Gat wrote in his decision, according to the Ynet news site.

Gat also said he took into account Amir’s past.

During the hearing, Amir argued that his arrest was politically motivated.

“This is a political arrest. I’m not sorry for a thing,” he said, according to the Walla news outlet.

His attorney said the post was not a threat against Rivlin’s life.

“Since he was released from prison he has become a man of peace. He’s not some violent right-winger who could pick up a gun tomorrow and try to get to Rubi Rivlin. He didn’t call, God forbid, for someone to hurt President Rivlin. He said something that everyone believes. Nobody is immortal,” the lawyer said, according to Ynet.

Amir was convicted in 1996 of conspiracy to commit murder and possession of a firearm, after his brother Yigal Amir’s assassination of Rabin after a peace rally in Tel Aviv on November 4, 1995.

He was released from prison in 2012, after serving a 16-year sentence for his role in the assassination. Both Amir brothers have repeatedly said they do not regret their actions.

Police said the investigation into Amir’s Facebook post was ongoing.