The murder of former premier Yitzhak Rabin by a right-wing extremist was “one of the worst crimes”, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said yesterday as Israel marked the 17th anniversary of the assassination. “The murder of Yitzhak Rabin was one of the worst crimes of the new age,” Netanyahu told ministers at the weekly cabinet meeting. The ministers held a minute’s silence to mark the anniversary of Rabin’s November 4, 1995 murder by a Jewish extremist who opposed his concessions to the Palestinians. Israel marks the date according to the Hebrew calendar. “It certainly besmirches the annals of the state and of Zionism,” Netanyahu said. Later, at a memorial ceremony for Rabin at Jerusalem’s Mount Herzl cemetery, Netanyahu raised the issue of Iran’s nuclear programme, which he said is a threat to the security of Israel, the region and the world. “Yitzhak Rabin identified that menace,” he said, adding that “we must remember another principle that he understood: the guarantee of peace is our strength and our ability to defend ourselves.”