The corner beneath Tel Aviv City Hall, in the parking lot between the City Garden (Gan H'aIr) shopping center and the flight of stairs where Yitzhak Rabin descended to his death on November 4 1995, is one of the coldest in the city; a windy spot the sun can barely find, the walls covered with graffitti and childish paintings of Rabin's face as a young man, as a young soldier, as an old man, as a peace maker.

This past week, Rabin would have been 77 years old. Every Friday since the day he was murdered, a few dozen people of all ages, gather at the place, where a memorial of broken blocks of volcanic stone brought from the Golan heights have been embedded into the sidewalk. This week, a few hundred people showed up. There was Ehud Barak, running for prime minister, and Yitzxhak Mordechai, also running for prime minister. There was Danny Yatom, the ex Mossad chief, and Matan Vilnai, the ex general. Leah Rabin was there of course, as was Dalia Rabin-Pilosoph, now running for Knesset.

The speeches were almost predictable -- Barak spoke of continuing Rabin's march, Yatom spoke of Rabin's love for the simple soldiers and his geostrategic vision. Dalia complained that the son of the devil killer her father and that it's time to get the devil out of the government.

The only speech that won truly spontaneous applause was Hanna Meron's. Hanna Meron is one of the queens of Israeli theater, an actress who lost a leg during a Palestinian terror incident way back in the late '60s. She has long been a spokeswoman for peace. In her speech, she called for "all those who want to bring down this horrible government to unite," and that's what created the wave of enthusiastic applause.

It was easy to understand why there was such enthusiasm. Waiting for the speeches to begin, Barak and Mordechai mingled, to the extent that anyone with a couple of bodyguards and some more policeman around them, can mingle in a a crowd that hasn't been vetted one by one through a metal detector. But it was even more interesting than that, because while Mordechai is supposed to be the golden andidate who can beat Bibi big in the second round of election, it was Barak who drew all the attention, so much so it was almost sad to see the proud and burly Mordechai standing off to the side of the crowd by himself (meaning with his entourage of security -- as an ex-defense minister -- and spokesman and spokesman's assistant) waiting for Barak to approach him. But Barak didn't approach Itzik, who was too proud to approach Barak. Only when all the VIPs were invited to sit down for the hour-long ceremony of speeches (and two of Rabuin's favorite songs) did the two ex-generals, one a former chief of staff, the other a former defense minister) shake hands.

Thus, at a birthday memorial for Rabin, the most ego-less politician in Israeli history, the most curious thing to watch was Mordechai's ego and how he still doesn't understand that his pride is not what this election is all about.

Yahoo's 1998 Israeli Election Page

Ariga's coverage of the 1996 Israeli elections

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