Last update - 02:15 13/06/2007
Mofaz: They never listened to me during the war
By Amos Harel
Every effort by Shaul Mofaz to contribute to the decision-making process during the Lebanon War was blocked, according to the transcript of his testimony before the Winograd Committee released yesterday.
"Every time I intervened, they did not accept my opinion," Mofaz said, referring to the war cabinet of seven ministers and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert.
Moreover, the transportation minister in Olmert's coalition government - and a key figure in the six-year period that the Winograd Committee examined in its probe of the Second Lebanon War - says that "he was attacked" when he voiced different views.
The testimony of Mofaz, who was minister of defense twice following the IDF withdrawal from southern Lebanon in 2000, and Chief of Staff during the withdrawal from Lebanon, was heavily censored by the committee for security reasons.
Bint Jbail battle
His criticism of the Bint Jbail battle and the decision to embark on the costly ground offensive toward the end of the campaign - both covered in the press - were not released for publication.
Mofaz confirmed in his testimony Olmert's claim that the political echelon authorized all the plans presented by the IDF during the war.
He explained that as a member of Olmert's war cabinet, "you do not have the total picture. A situation was created... in which, whatever the army recommended, we authorized," Mofaz said, referring to the prime minister and the ministers in the war cabinet.
"The minute they [the IDF] decided what action they would take, they bring it before you, and all you have to say is whether to support or oppose it, and avoid a situation that every couple of days you find yourself in new clashes over everything the army proposes, since they have taken into account all the data which you do not have," he explained.
"As a former defense minister and chief of staff, I think I was involved as much as a minister can be involved," Mofaz said.