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Dr. Aaron Lerner is co-founder of , Independent Media Review and Analysis, an Israel-based news organization which provides an extensive digest of media, polls and significant interviews and events relating to the Israeli-Arab conflict.
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By Dr. Aaron Lerner
May 4, 2007
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Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's spin team developed the argument that he should remain in office to implement the recommendations of the Winograd Committee report instead of simply resigning in disgrace.
But Mr. Olmert's behavior since the Lebanon War gives no indication that he or his team are capable of change.
Time and again since the war they have dropped the ball.
They dropped the ball by essentially ignoring UN Secretary General Kofi Annan's unilateral decision in his first report after UN Security Council Resolution 1701 to downgrade the disarming of Hizbullah to an internal Lebanese political problem. They failed miserably to promote Israel's interests in the implementation and possible enhancement of 1701.
They dropped the ball in the Gaza Strip, failing for months to come up with any serious initiatives to stop the massive flow of weapons from Egypt to the Palestinians nor the shocking Palestinian military preparations (military construction, manufacturing, force recruitment and training) taking place under the "security hiatus" (aka ceasefire).
The Olmert team doesn't even have a clear vision as to what it wants to tell the world about the crises:
- Should Israel publicly praise Egypt for contributing to stability or instead press for Egypt to act against the smuggling operations beyond an occasional photo op?
- What are Israel's immediate minimum security demands from the Palestinians in Gaza? Is it just that they shouldn't shoot too many rockets for the time being or is there more on Israel's list?
- If Mahmoud Abbas puts all the terrorists on the PA payroll, would that constitute eradication of the terror infrastructure?
And it hasn't gotten any better.
Just recently U.S. Secretary of State Rice gave the Olmert team a golden opportunity to propose a timetable of Palestinian compliance benchmarks.
But instead of rising to the occasion, the Olmert team waited for the Americans to come back with what appears to be a series of photo op Palestinian deployments along with a schedule for reducing Israel's security (removing roadblocks and other security measures) independent of the situation on the ground.
And what of Olmert himself?
He continues to shoot from the hip.
His remarks about Iran, for example, have been profoundly confusing and typically counter-productive.
When he rambles on about his ideas on Israeli-Palestinian relations, it often appears that they do not even attempt to cope with the harsh reality the nation has experienced since the retreat from Gaza.
Olmert and his team didn't learn from their mistakes until now. There is no reason to expect the future to be any different.
For the sake of the nation they must go home.
Views expressed by the author do not
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