Comptroller slams Barak's NIS 1m Paris hotel expenses

The State Comptroller's Office Wednesday sharply rebuked what it called wasteful expenditures incurred by Defense Minister Ehud Barak, his entourage and other leading military figures during a visit to the Paris Air Show this summer.

The comptroller's report stated that accommodation expenses for Barak's entourage alone totaled nearly NIS 500,000. The inner circle of the defense minister and Labor Party chairman - which included 16 of the 50 travelers - spent four times as much on hotels as it did the last time the defense minister visited Paris, a year earlier.

State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss said Wednesday that he considers the defense officials' behavior "grave."

"There is no place for spending so much on hotels and lavish suites, particularly during an economic crisis, when most citizens are struggling to make ends meet," he said.

The 16-page report paints a picture of wanton, careless spending of public money, and virtually no supervision of expenses.

Barak did not respond to the report, but a Defense Ministry spokesman noted that the findings do not show Barak was personally responsible for selecting accommodations for the trip, and said that that issue was being handled within the ministry.

"Nonetheless, the defense minister has instructed that from now on, all spending irregularities or deviations from regulations be submitted for his authorization," the spokesman said.

Barak, accompanied by his wife Nili Priel, traveled to Paris in June along with Israel Defense Forces representatives and other top defense officials, including representatives from Israel Radio and the Israel Defense Forces magazine Bamahane.

Barak's personal entourage racked up NIS 527,000 (96,000 euros) in hotel expenses, and accommodating the other 34 members of the Israeli delegation (who stayed in less luxurious accommodations) cost NIS 417 million. Altogether accommodations cost NIS 944,000, not including flights, food or any other expenditures.

The comptroller began investigating after media reports described the large delegation that went on the trip and the high expenses they accumulated.

The inquiry was handled by members of the security department within the State Comptroller's Office, led by Maj. Gen. (Res.) Yaakov Or. Investigators chose to take the unusual step of conducting a focused, accelerated inquiry into the spending, which they described as a small example "that testifies to the macro" phenomenon of exorbitant spending by members of the defense apparatus.

An accelerated examination, they said, could leave more of an impression than a more extensive inquiry, whose results would be released only two years later, when most of the officials involved would already be out of office.

The report did not address the initial decision to send such a large delegation, but rather focused on delegates' spending on hotels alone.

Barak's trip was planned well in advance, and hotel reservations were made by a Defense Ministry contingent in Paris.

That delegation includes members of the board of ministry employees, who often receive flights and other benefits as compensation for their work, a practice that ministry sources have long stated should be abandoned, in order to save the state millions of shekels a year.

Last October, the officials in Paris presented their findings to the Defense Ministry. They said that after checking several hotels - some of which were already full and others that were ruled out for security reasons - only one hotel remained, the InterContinental Paris Le Grand, where Barak had stayed the previous year.

A suite at the hotel costs 1,800 euros a night, but due to anticipated demand from Air Show visitors, the price had jumped almost 40 percent to 2,500 euros. The InterContinental also made several draconian demands - that the Israeli delegation commit to the suites within four days, and agree to pay for the reservation in full in the event of cancelation, and reserve the rooms for six days even though they needed them only for four, the officials said.

The reservation was eventually authorized by Barak's chief of staff, Brig. Gen. Mike Herzog. Herzog later said the defense minister did not participate in making the reservation.

The Defense Ministry spokesman said it "welcomes the state comptroller's statements on the importance of defense officials' participation in the Air Show, in the interest of advancing military exports by the State of Israel, which grew by dozens of percentage points in recent years, and bring Israel billions of dollars annually, support more than 100,000 households in Israel and allow the IDF to maintain its technological superiority."

"Immediately upon the delegation's return from abroad, Defense Minister Ehud Barak, in conjunction with the ministry director, Mr. Pinhas Buchris, ordered steps be taken to prevent the recurrence of errors discovered in ordering hotel rooms," the spokesman said.

	Defense Minister Ehud Barak.
	Photo by: (Emile Salman)