OLMERT REFUSES TO COOPERATE WITH OFFICAL INVESTIGATION

And he's about to pay for his contempt by receiving more embarrassment:

(IsraelNN.com) State Comptroller and Ombudsman Micha Lindenstrauss is gearing up to publish the initial findings of his investigation into the Home Front situation during last summer’s war against Hizbullah, in spite of fierce resistance from the office of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert after he refused to appear at committee hearings.

Lindenstrauss is preparing a report on the state of the home front during the war against Hizbullah, while the Winograd Commission prepares its report on the mismanagement of the war itself.

Unlike Defense Minister Amir Peretz and other senior officials, Olmert did not appear in person for his questioning and asked for an extra month to prepare written responses. The report, said Knesset member Zevulun Orlev, chairman of the Knesset’s State Control Committee, had been held up more than four months “due to the Prime Minister’s failure to cooperate.”

The National Union / National Religious Party Knesset member accused Olmert of “unacceptable, unreasonable and unworthy behavior.” Orlev charged Olmert and his aides with actions which he said “conveys indifference and lack of concern to the State’s citizens as to their fate on the home front, if and when the next war takes place.”

Likud Knesset Member Yuval Steinitz also attacked Olmert Sunday for his failure to cooperate with Comptroller Lindenstrauss, saying Olmert has abandoned the home front three times.

First, he said, Olmert failed to stop the Katyusha attacks on Israeli towns. Second, he failed to declare a state of war which would have helped give civilians the proper support. Finally, he said, Olmert is now also working against Lindenstrauss’s efforts to learn lessons from the war.

And if he's not willing to take positive steps or to cooperate in an investigation, then it's about time he step down.