Point being that "ls /path; rm $!" deletes something entirely different than "/path".

What you want is "ls /path; rm $_".

Even then, the above is fairly pointless. At the time you look at what you are deleting, it's gone.

I think you misunderstood the previous comment. I think that firstly "ls /path" is entered and if the result is ok, then "; rm $_" is added to the copy of the command then executed.

Yes, at which point you simply do:

1. ls /path

2. rm <esc><.>

(where "escape" "dot" brings up last argument) without the need to fiddle around with dollar signs underscores, exclamation marks, etc. to prevent further mistakes (e.g. "was it $! or !$ ?", shell expansion, etc)