Late premier´s casket placed at Knesset Plaza before funeral to allow public to pay its respects

The casket of former Prime Minister Yitzhak Shamir who passed away on Saturday at the age of 96, has been placed at the Knesset Plaza in Jerusalem. Knesset Speaker Reuven Rivlin eulogized Shamir and laid a wreath in his memory. Members of the public are paying their respects.

Shamir will be laid to rest on Monday evening in the Nation´s Great cemetery in Mount Herzl.

Rivlin said, "Yitzhak, you were an unbreakable rock. On your shoulders you carried the weight of this nation, its past and its future. Nothing made you stray from your path.

"Only one weakness managed to break this formidable rock, to carve its stones and make them into pillars of the Kingdom of Israel. It was love: your love for this persecuted people, your love for the ancestral homeland, your love for your children, your home, your Shulamit."

Various state officials and public figures expressed their sorrow over Shamir´s death on Saturday. "Yitzhak Shamir was a brave warrior for Israel, before and after its inception. He was a great patriot and his enormous contribution will be forever etched in our chronicles," President Shimon Peres said in a statement.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu lauded the former leader, saying that "He was a paragon of loyalty to the Land of Israel and the eternal values of the Jewish people." (Copyright 2012 © Yedioth Internet 07/02/12)