RFK Killer Sirhan a "Hero" in Palestine

55 years ago this month, the trial of Sirhan Sirhan got underway for the murder of 1968 Democratic presidential candidate Robert F. #Kennedy. The trial lasted three months.Show more

Eventually the jury found him guilty of first degree murder and assault with a deadly weapon with intent to commit murder (five counts; one for each of the other people Sirhan shot).

The official motive for Sirhan’s murder of #RFK was “anti-#Zionism.”

After he was captured by Kennedy’s bodyguards, witnesses in the Ambassador Hotel kitchen heard Sirhan say: “I can explain. I did it for my country. I love my country."

On Episode 20 of the "Kennedy Americans" podcast, we took a deep dive into the evidence for both the prosecution and the defense. Was Sirhan a mind-controlled patsy, or a Palestinian terrorist?

Whether Sirhan fired the fatal shots that killed #RFK or not -- a topic that is still debated among historians of the case today -- there is no doubt that Sirhan is heralded as a hero in the Palestinian Liberation Movement for assassinating Senator Kennedy (an act Sirhan claims he has no memory of).

Shortly after the RFK assassination, Al #Fatah, the Arab Commando organization, distributed thousands of posters with pictures of Sirhan over the words, “I did it for my country!"

In September 1970 the Popular Front for the Liberation of #Palestine (PFLP) hijacked three passenger planes and demanded the release of Sirhan Sirhan from prison. After releasing the hostages, the Palestinian hijackers blew up one of the planes on a Cairo runway "in retaliation for the United States' support of #Israel."

Three Arabs hijacked a West German jumbo jet in February 1972 on which RFK's eldest son Joseph P. Kennedy (then 19 years old) was a passenger. The plane, on a flight from New Delhi to Athens, landed safely eight hours later at Aden, Southern #Yemen. That specific flight was targeted because the terrorists knew Kennedy would be on board.

In 1973, when the Black September group burst into the embassy of Saudi Arabia in Khartoum and took 10 hostages, their demands included the release of Sirhan Sirhan from prison.

Sirhan told David Frost in a 1989 interview: "I wanted to show that the Palestinian problem didn't just erupt with the assassination of #Kennedy," a reference to the displacement of Palestinians after the Arab-Israeli war of 1948.

"If I had shot Bobby Kennedy in an Arab country, I doubt any Arab court would have convicted me," he said with a smile.

By killing RFK Sirhan advanced the cause of the Palestinians, a cause which promoted the return of Arab land from the state of Israel.

He told Robert Kaiser in 1969, "They (the Palestinians) want action. They want results. Hey! I produced action for them. I'm a big hero over there."

Sirhan Sirhan is now 79. If he is ever released on parole he will most likely be deported immediately back to Palestine or Jordan because he is not a U.S. citizen. Will he receive a hero's welcome in the Arab world? We can only wonder.

In this highlight from Episode 24 of "Strange Bedfellows" I discuss with guest Caleb Maupin growing concerns over #RFKJr's safety as he now finds himself treading the same dangerous waters that inflamed his father's convicted killer: campaigning for president on an antiwar platform while staunchly supporting Israel's war against #Hamas, attracting death threats from mentally ill stalkers and political fanatics while left unprotected by the U.S. Secret Service.

Watch the premiere tonight at 9 P.M. Eastern.

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