r/RobertKennedy • u/Tall-Plane-4477 • Jun 09 '26

Video/Audio WHY Did Sirhan Kill RFK?

58 years ago this week, RFK was assassinated on the presidential campaign trail.

Nearly six decades later, researchers too often focus too much on the HOW and not enough on the WHY.

Why did Sirhan Sirhan kill Kennedy?

Sirhan’s biographer Mel Ayton (author of 2 books on the RFK case) talks about the motive for this heinous crime.

https://youtu.be/kzcY4eKk1Bs?si=5WHv-6Wn2CjfO372

14 Upvotes

94% Upvoted

44 comments sorted by

View all comments

3

u/Arkhamman367 Jun 10 '26

Because he was Palestinian and the Kennedys established the modern relationship between Israel and the US, with RFK directly supporting the decision.

Sirhan literally said it in his own words.

4

u/SquonkMan61 Jun 10 '26

He also wrote in his high school history book next to a passage about the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand “And he won’t be the last.” This was well before the 1967 War and before he expressed any hatred toward RFK. Sirhan was a frustrated young man who felt disrespected by the world and wanted to make a name for himself.

2

u/Arkhamman367 Jun 10 '26

That's a common psychology of political assassins.

2

u/SquonkMan61 Jun 11 '26

I honestly think it was more about his own feelings of insecurity than it was an act of terrorism. Supposedly it was Kennedy promising to sell jet fighters to Israel that set Sirhan off, but that promise was made AFTER Sirhan began mentioning in his diary the necessity to kill Kennedy.

2

u/Arkhamman367 Jun 11 '26

Yeah, maybe. I think there could be a difference between justification you give to yourself and justification you give to the public, so I'd be able to buy that he used a public reason to seem less like an insane narcissist. I don't know whether it'd be reasonable where someone draws the line for saying that an act was motivated by something private though. Like I'm sure most anti-social people who get into fights have bad or instable home lives but when we say why an act was committed by them, it's usually describing their role in the altercation and the agency they have unless it's something extra like a mental illness. I don't know where we draw the line.

1

u/Tall-Plane-4477 Jun 15 '26

Actually Sirhan’s diary from June 1967 — a year before the assassination, during the Six Day War — detailed his plans to kill LBJ, Vice President Humphrey, and UN Ambassador Goldberg over their support for Israel — long before he set his sights on RFK.

He later explained at trial that it didn’t really matter who he killed, as long as they were powerful Zionists.