Today, Ehud Olmert, Israel’s Acting Prime Minister, rejected those calls, and said that there would be no official inquiry.
MKs on both ends of the political spectrum as well as President Moshe Katsav have called for an official investigation of the events in Amona. Even Israel’s Attorney General, Menachem Mazuz, who has not demonstrated any particular friendship to Israel’s right wing, hinted, according to a report on Israel Radio today, that police erred by using excessive violence during the evacuation of the on Wednesday. Today, he told the cabinet that other methods of evacuation could have been employed to remove the protesters from the site.
Yet Mazuz, in the very hypocritical fashion Israelis have come to refer to as “politics” backed Olmert’s decision not to hold an inquiry.
In light of the fact that even the most left-wing members of Knesset, such as Yuli Tamir, have been calling for such an investigation, Olmert’s refusal leaves a huge question mark over his government. And it is a question that must be answered before the elections. That question is, what is Olmert afraid of?
Is he afraid that such an investigation would include in its mandate the role of the government in fostering an attitude that a significant segment of Israel’s population are viewed as “outsiders”? Is he afraid that it will include an investigation into how and why Israeli right wingers are driven to establish communities the government refuses to legalize? Is he afraid it will examine how any Jewish government can drive Jews out of their homes and then fail to pay the promised compensation? Is he afraid of an investigation into why such “removals” of illegal communities are not carried out when the communities in question are Arab? Or is he afraid, perhaps, that it will ask how and why the government has come to value the destruction of Jewish communities over the development of the Land of Israel?
In explaining his reason for refusing to establish such an inquiry, Olmert said that, "The police and the army must be left out of the political squabbling. … The security forces cannot be exploited as a means for discrediting the government."
It is all fine and good for the police and army to engage in the government’s politically motivated violence, and to serve as the tools of oppression of our Jewish citizenry. It is even desirable, from Olmert’s apparent point of view, that a significant portion of Israel’s population be divested of any respect or validation they hold for the police and army. That many of Israel’s most highly motivated youth are now considering refusal to join the army is perfectly fine with Olmert and the anti-Zionist clique he is forming. It would be just another reason to point a finger at the Israeli right, and just another way to show the world how anti-State we are.
But for the entire Israeli public, left-to-right, to call for an inquiry and public accountability of the state security apparatus – a measure of accountability so vital to the proper workings of democracy – that is inexcusable exploitation for political means, according to Olmert.
Until Olmert allows such an inquiry, no one will need to exploit any security forces to discredit this government. Olmert is doing quite a good job on his own. Perhaps the most necessary commission of inquiry should be one to examine why Israelis still insist on voting for him.
Copyright 2006. All rights reserved. Yehuda Poch is a journalist living in Israel. Reproduction in electronic or print format by permission of the author only.
