POLICE INVESTIGATOR RECOMMENDS CHARGING OLMERT

The latest on the probe into Ehud Olmert's bank scam:

(IsraelNN.com) The head of the police investigative team probing Olmert's alleged intervention in the Bank Leumi privatization recommends charges against the Prime Minister.

According to a report in the Yisrael Hayom Hebrew-language commuter paper this week, the entire investigative team that was actively engaged in the probe supports the decision to indict the Prime Minister, in opposition to the stance taken by the head of the Police Department's Investigations Wing, Yochanan Danino.

The Bank Leumi case is one of four cases against the Prime Minister currently being investigated by the police. It involves suspicions that Olmert, as Acting Minister of Finance in late 2005, attempted to change the terms of the sale of the bank to fit the terms of two of his friends, who were in the bidding to buy it. The friends later dropped out.

The police have apparently found that had the sale gone through according to the amended terms, the State of Israel stood to lose $250 million.

Now there's one thing remaining: since the State Prosecutor who would make a final decision on this, Eran Shendar, has left his position, who'll be the one to make it now? Will it be Attorney General Manny Mazuz? Better still, will he or anyone to take the place of the prosecutor make a decision at all?