Israel: A Masterclass In Open Debate On War In Lebanon

WRITING in the Guardian, Jonathan Freedland looks at the Israeli investigation into the county’s second Lebanon war.

The result is a tribite to Isrel’s country’s open govenment, if not its leaders policies.

Write Freedland:
“LET’S hope Lords Hutton and Butler were taking notes. An 81-year-old retired judge, Eliyahu Winograd, has just given a masterclass in how to conduct a genuine, fearless and plainspoken inquiry into a government failure. While our own inquisitors into aspects of the Iraq war retreated either into whitewash (Hutton) or polite circumlocution (Butler), Winograd delivered it straight, and right between the eyes. Asked by the Israeli prime minister, Ehud Olmert, to probe the country’s ’second Lebanon war’ last summer, he issued an interim verdict on Monday which required no translation from the mandarin code of euphemism. Olmert was, said the judge, guilty of ‘a severe failure’ of judgment, rushing into a ‘hasty’ war with no clear plan, setting ‘overambitious and unobtainable goals’. Others were at fault but, as prime minister, Olmert bore ’supreme responsibility’. Short of handing the PM a revolver, Winograd could not have been harsher.”

Evidence that the Middle East’s only democracy functions well and is accountable to the people.

Who are Hizbollah accountable to?

Anorak

Posted: 2nd, May 2007 | In: Twitterings Comment | Follow the Comments on our RSS feed: RSS 2.0 | TrackBack | Permalink