Jerusalem – Allies and opponents clamored Tuesday for Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s resignation after an official commission’s scathing criticism of his performance in last year’s Lebanon war. Olmert, visibly drained by the ordeal, insisted he could ride out the storm.
Olmert might be able to hang on for now. His coalition partners are wary of any further upheaval that might loosen their grip on power.
But the crisis may cripple policymaking, especially on peace efforts, and all of Olmert’s desperate efforts to survive could run aground if public outcry swells.
“It’s a very big drama, and the seismograph is shaking,” said Avraham Diskin, a political science professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. “But a real earthquake may not come, or might be delayed.”
Olmert took the blow of his long political life Monday when a government probe tarred him as acting rashly in the initial stage of the war against Hezbollah guerrillas, who seized two Israeli soldiers and bombarded northern Israeli communities with rockets.
Olmert tried to project a business-as-usual image on Tuesday, attending a swearing-in ceremony for Israel’s new police commissioner and instructing Defense Minister Amir Peretz to draw up a plan for dismantling unauthorized West Bank settlement outposts.
But Olmert – who was up all night reading the 263-page report, aides said – looked haggard and struggled to stay awake at the police ceremony. TV cameras caught his eyes closing several times, and local stations ran the scene again and again.
Newspapers demanded that Olmert step down, saying he had lost the confidence of the Israeli people. Seven out of 10 Israelis surveyed by Israel Radio shortly after the war probe was released said he should quit.
Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni of Olmert’s Kadima Party is ahead of her boss in polls, but former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of the hawkish Likud Party would be premier if elections were held now.
