Prime Minister Ehud Olmert waswell aware of the condition of the bomb shelters in northern Israel but decided to go to war any way, said Ra'anan Dinur, director-general of the Prime Minister's Office.
Dinur spoke at a press conference Wednesday, following the publication of the State Comptroller's report regardingthe preparedness and functioning of the home front during last summer's war.
Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, former Defense Minister Amir Peretz ,government ministers, former Chief of Staff Dan Halutz and Home Front Command chief Major-General Yitzhak Gershon have each failed severely in the processes of decision making, evaluation and estimation in their handling of the home front during the Second Lebanon War ,"said the report
Olmert, said Dinur, knew the home front might suffer a serious blow from Hizbullah's missiles. "The prime minister knew about all the dangers facing the home front, including that of Hizbullah's missiles… the readiness of the shelters was one of the most important subjects discussed, but we had to weigh the risks facing us now against those facing us in the future, should we decide not to act."
The prime minister, added Dinur, was informed of the shelters' situation by officials in the Home Front Command as well as by IDF Chief of Staff Lieutenant-General Dan Halutz.
"The decision was made after he (Olmert) had all the facts and was based on the need to fight off an immediate threat.
"More so – the shelters came up in every discussion every meeting we had with the military or the cabinet during the war. I was personally assigned to the matter and we had a clear picture of what was going on," said Dinur.
"This war should be seen in the greater context of what we've learned about the home front… it shouldn't be defined as our successes or our failure.
"The lessons learned brought on a series of changes in dealing with the home front, including reassigning the responsibility for dealing with shelter readiness and emergency economy to the Defense Ministry," he added.
"Should war breakout tomorrow we are better prepared now than we were a year ago, but we're still off the mark."