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Olmert - comptroller out to get him?
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Lindenstrauss - to recommend criminal investigation
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Associates: Comptroller out to get Olmert

Recommendation for criminal investigation against Olmert regarding bribery allegations in sale of Bank Leumi majority shares reignites feud between prime minister and comptroller. 'Olmert feels that critique has ceased to be relevant,' say PM associates, 'it feels like a witch hunt'

The mutual confrontation between Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office and that of State Comptroller Justice Micha Lindenstrauss did not begin with the fresh report of the latter's recommendation to open a criminal investigation against the former for bribery offenses in the selling of Bank Leumi's majority shares. Olmert's associates are of the opinion that the comptroller has long since stepped over the line and claim: "He's out to get him (Olmert) personally, who's not at any fault. Otherwise what explaination can there be for all these allegations which have been proven false?"

 

Olmert's office refuses to comment officially on the issue. However the reactions from the PM's office following Linderstrauss' recommendation were unusually strong. "Any honest man who was to look over the allegations would conclude that this time, as before, it is a case of blood libel," Olmert's office responded. Sources also expressed their wonder over the haste to return the case to the Attorney General: "doesn't that strike you as odd," they said.

 

Official sources within Olmert's office refuse to say more but behind closed doors they describe a very difficult atmosphere in regards to the comptroller ever since Olmert was elected. "The house on November 29th St., the house on Cremieux st., the pens, the Authority for Small Businesses and now Bank Leumi – all these probes were conducted in the last six months. Two have already been proven false," says a close associate of Olmert's, "what does Justice Lindenstrauss want to do? Destroy Olmert? Where is the restraint? Every baseless accusation becomes something to torture him with?

 

"Somebody in the comptroller's office has lost his proportionality in his rage against the Prime Minister," said another source from Olmert's office, "they've lost all balance. All these allegations made by the comptroller about Olmert's houses are completely unfounded and all the other allegations, those that have been investigated and those that will be investigated – are utterly without base. The Prime Minister operates and has in the past operated under a magnifying glass, this is not a situation that has come into play only since today. All these claims against him have been investigated in the past and were all refuted. He has remained spotless and any attempts by the state comptroller to mark him are destined to fail."

 

Olmert himself refuses to comment on the matter and is cooperating with the attorney general in every way. This having been said, Olmert was absent from a state comptroller meeting held this week by Justice Lindenstrauss where he was t respond to allegations of inappropriate appointments to the Small Business Authority.

 

"Olmert feels that the state comptroller's critique has ceased to be relevant," the PM's office says, "'it feels like a witch hunt. The Prime Minister doesn't have any problems with criticism, on the contrary. But the feeling is that he's been marked as a target by the comptroller."

 

Comptroller to officially recommend probe on Sunday

State Comptroller Justice Lindenstrauss will officially recommend that Attorney General Menachem Mazuz open a criminal investigation against Olmert early next week. Lindenstrauss sent a telegram to Mazuz on Wednesday, saying that he is leaving the case to Mazuz, implicating that he believes that there exists a suspicion that Olmert was criminally involved in the sale of Bank Leumi's majority shares.

 

The comptroller's office claims that grave evidence has been collected against Olmert, which allegedly show a clear conflict of interests while working on the details of the tender for the bank's acquisition. Lindenstrauss' recommendation will obligate the attorney general to decide whether or not to open an investigation into the matter within six months, though the goal is for the decision to be made as soon as possible.

 

Earlier this week media reports claimed that Olmert, along with additional parties, allegedly committed criminal bribery offenses during the sale of the majority shares in Bank Leumi in 2005.

The allegations claim that Olmert, who was Minister of Finance at the time, apparently broke the law for two of his friends – Daniel Abrams and Frank Lowy – with whom he conducted, directly and indirectly, a relationship which allegedly involved bribe.

 

In November 2005, after the majority shares were sold, Olmert said that this was a great achievement for the Israeli market in general and the privatization process in particular. "The sale of such a large share package in a major Israeli bank," he said, "when the shares are at a record high, to a strategic investor will increase competition between the banks and contribute to the local market and capital."

 

Aviram Zino contributed to this report

 

 


פרסום ראשון: 10.27.06, 00:35
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