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Olmert faces backlash over Lebanon war
I'm too disgusted to comment. Condi will NEVER get my vote as PresidentJERUSALEM (Reuters) - Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert faced a backlash on Friday over a U.N. proposal to end the war in Lebanon, with army officers saying they were held back and right-wing rivals calling for new elections. "Olmert must go," read a front page headline in Israel's left-leaning Haaretz newspaper. Opinion polls, conducted before details of the proposed Security Council resolution emerged, showed public support eroding for Olmert, a career politician who lacks the combat credentials of many of his predecessors. Twenty percent of those surveyed by Haaretz believed Israel was winning the war. Leading members of the right-wing opposition Likud party called the resolution a victory for Hizbollah. "We will work to bring down the government," said Likud's Silvan Shalom. Yuval Steinitz, also of Likud, said the Israeli government should resign and call new elections. Some Israeli military commanders said an expanded ground offensive, authorized by Olmert and his security cabinet on Wednesday, should not have been put on hold. They accused Olmert of denying the army a chance to gain more ground militarily to secure a ceasefire that would be more favorable to Israel and less so to Hizbollah leader Sayyed Hassan Nasrallah. Army officers said Israeli troops massed along the Lebanese border were now "sitting ducks" while Israeli political leaders awaited the outcome of the negotiations at the United Nations. "We need to keep on going with the military operation," one officer said. He did not want to be identified. Another officer told Haaretz: "Nasrallah will continue to mock us, and in the end there will be another war." Justice Minister Haim Ramon defended the government, telling Israel Radio: "War in the name of the war is not an objective." Tzachi Hanegbi, a senior member of Olmert's Kadima party, said that, if it was possible to remove Hizbollah from southern Lebanon through diplomacy, "obviously this is far preferable to a military clash with its heavy price in lives of fighters." LATEST PROPOSAL The latest proposal calls for the existing U.N. peacekeeping force in Lebanon to be reinforced by French and other troops, although Beirut has rejected a proposed mandate allowing the use of force for more than just self-defense. Hizbollah would pull out from south of the Litani river, 13 miles from the border -- as Israel wants. Israeli critics say the resolution would not secure the immediate release of two soldiers seized by Hizbollah, whose capture on July 12 sparked the war, and does not guarantee the guerrilla group's disarmament. Political sources said Israel was still pushing for changes to the resolution to make sure troops would withdraw only once the expanded peacekeeping force was on the ground. Israel also wants the resolution to spell out how an embargo will be enforced to prevent Hizbollah from receiving new arms. A poll published in Haaretz on Friday showed only 48 percent of Israelis were satisfied with Olmert's performance compared with more than 75 percent early in the fighting. A poll in the mass-circulation Yedioth Ahronoth showed 66 percent were satisfied with Olmert, down from 73 percent. Haaretz columnist Ari Shavit wrote: "You cannot lead an entire nation to war promising victory, produce humiliating defeat and remain in power." Ben Caspit, a columnist for Maariv, agreed that it would be hard for Olmert to remain: "The public in Israel will not keep silent about this month.. without reaching a victory or exacting an appropriate price." (Additional reporting by Jonathan Saul) Posted by: Frank G 2006-08-11 |
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