PM's approval ratings plunge to abysmal levels

Tel Aviv: The fighting between Hezbollah and Israel might have finished nine months ago but fresh Israeli casualties now seem inevitable following Monday's damning report by the Winograd commission.

So visceral was the criticism of Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, and Amir Peretz, his defence minister, that it is impossible to see them serving out their three remaining years in office.

The commission painted a picture of hasty, ill-informed decision making by Olmert who rushed Israel into an unwinnable war within a few hours of a cross-border raid by Hezbollah fighters last July 12.

Instead of sounding out senior diplomats about how Israel's strategic position might be affected or military planners about what Israel's army could realistically achieve, Olmert rushed into a full-blown conflict.

Trenchant

And when the war was over, Israel had failed in its stated goals of freeing the two Israeli soldiers captured in the Hezbollah raid and neutralising the Shiite fighters.

But while the language of the Winograd commission was trenchant, the reality is that most Israeli politicians and voters had long since reached this same conclusion many months ago.

Olmert's polling figures have collapsed to levels that would embarrass most elected representatives. A recent poll suggested only two per cent of Israeli voters trust Olmert, the man who is charged with running Israel. Peretz's figures are even worse.

Long before the Winograd commission report, their approval or, to be more accurate, disapproval ratings had reached levels from which many in Israel believe it is simply impossible for them to recover.

So while the end of their term in office is regarded as inevitable the issue has become when it will happen and the coalition politics of the Israeli system mean the rickety government may still limp on for some time. Elected in March 2006 at the head of the newly-formed Kadima party, Olmert was able to put together a coalition together with Peretz's Labour movement, shored up by right-wing religious party and pensioners' rights group.

As long as Olmert can cajole, coerce and persuade the other coalition partners to continue supporting him, then he can remain in power. Only when those partners perceive it no longer worth their while to support him, will he become the latest casualty of the war.