Olmert faces post-war disappointment

By James Reynolds
BBC News in Jerusalem

Many Israelis are disappointed with their Prime Minister

Israel's post-war post-mortem is being performed in public.

There seems to be a simple rule right now: if you have any kind of official title in this country, the chances are that you didn't come out of this conflict all that well.

That certainly applies for the Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, whose first-ever turn as a wartime leader has not worked out as well as he had hoped.

"When Olmert entered into this war there's reason to speculate that he was hoping to emerge from it the way Margaret Thatcher emerged from the Falklands War," says Amotz Asa-El, a columnist with the Jerusalem Post.

"In other words, an operation that came in response to an unprovoked attack whose subsequent military action was swift, resolute and very crowning for whoever led it."

Popular disappointment

But it hasn't turned out like that.

Israel's military campaign has not achieved its stated objectives; the country's captured soldiers have not been returned, and Hezbollah has not been disarmed.

A few steps from Israel's border with Lebanon, children play in the small Kibbutz of Yiron.

From the border fence you can see the homes of a Lebanese village on the hilltop - with binoculars you can even see into their windows.

I think he [Ehud Olmert] went to the war without being really prepared Ada Seremy

Many Israelis fled this kibbutz during the last month of fighting. Now they've come back, and they're disappointed with their Prime Minister.

"Look, I think he went to the war without being really prepared," says Ada Seremy, who has lived here since 1949.

"I think we had all the rights in this war because they (Hezbollah) were really doing bad things to us, but I think when you decide to go for a war you have to prepare."

This popular disappointment leaves Ehud Olmert with a very real problem.

He was elected earlier this year almost entirely on a single promise: to finish the job begun by Ariel Sharon and draw up Israel's borders for good.

Sharon started the job last summer when he withdrew unilaterally from the Gaza Strip. Olmert was expected to finish it in the next few years by withdrawing from parts of the Palestinian West Bank.

But, then came this summer. Now Israelis are not so sure about another unilateral withdrawal.

Hard task

In parliament on Monday, Ehud Olmert found it hard to persuade his audience that he was leading Israel in the right direction.

He may not find all that much comfort from his allies either. Major General Giora Eiland planned last year's unilateral pullout from Gaza: part one of the Sharon-Olmert border plan. But now, even this man, the faithful general, doubts the chances of part two.

Today - to support unilateral withdrawal from the West Bank, you have to be deaf, daft or blind Meir Shetreet

"At least 70-80% of the people of Israel understand that unilateral withdrawal might create another proxy in the West Bank that might be supported by Iran just as Hezbollah was supported in Lebanon, and that is a risk that the state of Israel should not bear," says General Eiland.

This risk can be measured by the smell of burning rubber - the speed with which politicians are now running away from the same policy that got them elected.

Right now, Ehud Olmert's allies in the Kadima party are scrambling to say they had nothing to do with the idea of unilateral withdrawal from bits of the West Bank - and that anyone who even thinks about it is generally pretty crazy.

"Today - to support unilateral withdrawal from the West Bank, you have to be deaf, daft or blind, "says Meir Shetreet, a cabinet minister.

So one question now remains.

Ehud Olmert is just three months into his term of office. If he can't carry out his promise of drawing up Israel's borders - what is he going to do with the remaining years of his administration?