Court Rejects Appeal by Rabin’s Assassin

The Supreme Court rejected an appeal by assassinated Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin’s killer, Yigal Amir, saying his lawyers’ theory about a second gunman was “rooted in fantasy.” Amir, in the 12th day of a hunger strike to protest prison conditions in Beersheba, did not travel to Jerusalem for the hearing, the first he has missed since his arrest. Judge Eliezer Goldberg read the decision for the three-judge panel, saying the bullets that killed Rabin came from the gun of Amir and that there was no doubt he committed the murder. A lower court in March sentenced Amir, 26, to a term of life plus six years in prison for assassinating Rabin and wounding his bodyguard at a Tel Aviv peace rally Nov. 4.