Last update - 00:00 03/12/2007
PM: Ability to implement all home front improvements is limited
By Jonathan Lis, Haaretz Correspondent and Haaretz Service
Israel can only afford to provide its citizens with protection, not comfort, in the event of another war, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert told a Knesset State Control Committee hearing Monday.
Olmert added that "an assessment of threats the State of Israel currently faces shows that we have to undertake specific defensive measures to protect our state and its citizens." He said that the implications - budgetary and otherwise - of fully implementing these measures make them inconceivable at this juncture.
Olmert stated that the numerous threats facing Israel do not allow the investment of tens of billions of shekels solely to improve the comfort of defensive facilities during wartime.
"We must invest only the minimum, in order to guarantee physical safety," the prime minister said. "Defensive measures are not intended to provide ideal conditions and comfort."
State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss also addressed the meeting and gave a scathing criticism of the government's decision-making process during the Second Lebanon War.
The director-general of the Prime Minister's Office, Raanan Dinor, told those attending the meeting that the government made the decision to go to war knowing full well the state of the home front.
MKs who attended the meeting, including the committee chairman Zvulun Orlev (NRP), highlighted the gap between the comptroller's report on the government's shotrcomings during the war, and the picture that Olmert and his associates were painting.
Olmert replied that previous governments are equally to blame. "I didn't hear anyone on July 12 [the first day of the war] saying that I should have told Hezbollah 'hang on, excuse me, please postpone your fire by a few months, we first have to make sure all the shelters are fit.'"
He said that "Israel did not start the war; it broke because someone abducted Israeli soldiers, fired on the north of the country and killed eight soldiers."
Olmert said that declaring a state of emergency was unnecessary throughout the war, since "it is to be declared when essential supplies are unavailable through the state apparatus."
Olmert said it was not the case during the war, when "three quarters of the country continued on as usual, prospered and fully functioned. There was no shortage of food. The only difficulty we encountered was transporting the supplies efficiently. Shops, stores and shopping centers were all open as usual."
Olmert said that all wars in the future will involve the home front, and said he has no intentions of evacuating communities under fire. "As long as I am prime minister, this will not be on the agenda. We do not run away," he said.
Olmert downplayed the significance of a tent city set up by billionaire Arcadi Gaydamak at Nitzanim Beach during the war to house families evacuated from their homes in the Katyusha-stricken north. He said that while the billionaire managed to provide assistance to 4,000 families at the camp, the government was evacuating 140,000 citizens of the north.
Dinor added that the government was required to evacuate the tent city due to fear of pollution.
A few months ago the National Security Council recommended that the Public Security Ministry assume responsibility for the home front instead of the Defense Ministry.
Olmert rejected the bid without providing a reason. He said "the report of the National Security Council was submitted to the government, but I disagree with its recommendations; this is a right the government retains. We did it because, given the state of affairs in the summer of 2007 - and I cannot share the specific considerations that were relevant at the time - we thought that given the fact that the Public Security Ministry lacks the logistical infrastructure, human resources and adequate managerial echelons, it would be unserious."
Olmert and Dinor said that despite the criticism they faced for failing to mobilize Home Front Command reservists, it did not affect the unit's work. Dinor said that whenever he asked the Home Front chief for additional troops, they were made immediately available.
Regev to Winograd: IDF should have let journalists into Lebanon right away
The Israel Defense Forces Spokesman's Office was wrong to not let journalists into Lebanon from the onset of the Second Lebanon War last summer, according to testimony given by former IDF spokeswoman Miri Regev released on Monday.
Regev gave the testimony to the Winograd Commission, which is charged with probing the management of the war. She said that journalists should have been let into Lebanon "in order to convey the achievements of the army, the battles and the identification... I think that we made a mistake in that in the course of almost three weeks, the pictures that existed were of missiles."
"I think we made a big mistake," she reiterated.
In a veiled criticism of former IDF chief of staff Dan Halutz, Regev referenced his cessation of daily news briefs to the press, which she also suggested was a mistake.
Regev said that the value of journalists entering Lebanon with IDF forces was proved once they were allowed to do so, and "there wasn't one article that didn't demonstrate identification with the IDF and its fighters."
Professor Ruth Gavison, who sits on the Winograd panel, asked Regev why "the north wasn't a closed military zone during the fighting," which would have given the army control over media policy, as Hezbollah had done in Lebanon. Regev replied that there is no symmetry in the management of media between Israel and Lebanon.
Regev also urged a national public relations campaign to be launched to be "responsible for national morale" in times of crisis, because the IDF should not have to be in charge of such matters. Regev said that a national spokesman should be appointed - "a person with understanding of security, a person with a bit of white hair who gives off a paternal feel."
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