Ehud Olmert, Ex-Israeli PM, Is Suspect In Bribe Case, Police Say

JERUSALEM — Former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, who was driven from office last year while facing mounting corruption charges, has been identified as a prime suspect in a separate bribery case, police said Thursday.

The 63-year-old Olmert returned to Israel from Europe early Thursday amid reports of his involvement in the case. Police suspect millions of dollars changed hands to promote several real estate projects, including a controversial residential development in Jerusalem that required a radical change in zoning laws.

A string of corruption cases have plagued current and former Israeli officials in recent years. A former finance minister, ceremonial president and other Cabinet ministers have been indicted or convicted on charges ranging from fraud to rape.

Olmert, who was mayor of Jerusalem at the time the residential development project was approved in the 1990s, has denied any wrongdoing.

Olmert said in a televised statement Thursday that the charges were "baseless rumors" and that he was the victim of "character assassination."

"I have never been offered bribes and I never accepted bribes from anybody in any regard and in any way, directly or indirectly," he said.

Police confirmed the former Israeli leader was a suspect after a court-issued gag order was eased. A string of media reports this week have implicated him obliquely in the affair.

Olmert has not been questioned by police in the affair yet, and no charges have been filed against him or any of the six people – including Olmert's successor as Jerusalem mayor – who have already been arrested in the case. Police had no word on when Olmert would be interrogated.

Police say the scope of the latest corruption affair dwarfs any of the other cases in which Olmert has been implicated.

The whiff of corruption has stubbornly clung to the former Israeli leader throughout his three decades in politics, quickly overshadowing his initial reputation as an anti-corruption crusader.

His political downfall began snowballing two years ago when Jewish-American businessman Morris Talansky told an Israeli court how he handed Olmert envelopes stuffed with tens of thousands of dollars in cash.

He was forced to announce his resignation in September 2008, after police accused him of double- and triple-billing Jewish organizations for trips abroad and pocketing the difference. He left politics after the February 2009 elections that installed Benjamin Netanyahu as prime minister.

Olmert, who has maintained he is innocent of all charges, is currently standing trial in both cases, plus separate allegations of cronyism. All the charges predate his tenure as prime minister.

Comments

[FACTISFACT]

04:22 PM on 04/16/2010

The Prominent Legal Expert opined that ex Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is not only a corrupt person but a heinous criminal Jew who intentionally insulted the souls of all the massacred Jews of Holocaust by repeating the same Holocaust in Gaza strip and behaved like a pure Nazi.
For a criminal he to take bribe is but a small thing and telling lies is imbued in all individuals of his clan including himself. He is genocide criminal and his successor is an assassination expert.
These legal Experts said ex PM is a suspect of a sensational genocide case and his successor a prime suspect of Dubai assassination case where in he authorized MOSSAD (the Israel’s government controlled assassination intelligent organization) to assassinate HAMAS political leader in Dubai. Warrants to secure the arrests of the prime suspects has been issued. And Interpol had been notified.
Finally these experts asked does this not speak out volumes of the country of which these criminals are the political leaders? There is another Minister who had been is still now a terrorist leader. In a tiny country if it is filled up with full of criminals and corrupt political leaders possesses nuclear WMDS in hundreds and nuclear facilities to manufacture nuclear arsenals what could happen to the world if action is not taken.

[Matt12]

02:46 PM on 04/16/2010

OMG Not money again!

[Ric NYC]

02:01 PM on 04/16/2010

Bribery?

"Rep. Jane Harman, the California Democrat with a longtime involvement in intelligence issues, was overheard on an NSA wiretap telling a suspected Israeli agent that she would lobby the Justice Department reduce espionage-related charges against two officials of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee, the most powerful pro-Israel organization in Washington. Harman was recorded saying she would "waddle into" the AIPAC case "if you think it'll make a difference," according to two former senior national security officials familiar with the NSA transcript."

http://www.drudge.com/archive/120131/wiretap-harman-offered-help-aipac

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/04/20/jane-harman-recorded-on-w_n_188795.html

"Harman's potential crime was "to do a favor in exchange for something of value, which is to say, to get appointed to be the chair of the House intelligence committee."

In other words, a violation of the federal bribery statute, Title 18, Section 201. By the terms of this law, it doesn't matter whether Harman followed through on her pledge to take action on the AIPAC case -- only that she said she would, in exchange for something of value."

http://tpmmuckraker.talkingpointsmemo.com/2009/04/did_harman_break_the_law.php

[skialethia]

12:57 PM on 04/16/2010

When Uri Blau shares what he learned from secret IDF documentation in his possession Palestinians can demand that the war criminals responsible for crimes committed during Operation Cast Lead and other crimes committed against Palestinians routinely be arrested in any country they visit.

Olmert is one of these. His chickens are coming home to roost. Karma is a beautiful, beautiful thing. It's universal justice or God's wrath depending on which way you look at it, but the beauty of it is that it gets the last word.

Oh, and the Israel apologists are always pointing fingers at the corruption of Palestinian leaders. Hahahahahaha!

[JustMeInNY]

03:52 PM on 04/16/2010

There is no bigger corruption than stealing millions from your own poor people to save the skin of your wife and daughter, move them to Paris where the continue to live a lavish life while the Palestinians continue to suffer.

[Nwo2012]

11:54 AM on 04/18/2010

Way to prove Ski's point!

[Nwo2012]

08:11 AM on 04/19/2010

haha!

Way to prove Ski's point..!

[tacevad]

09:46 AM on 04/16/2010

Bribery is a way of life in the entire world, some criminals are just better at it than others.
Think not here? Politicians have built a sweet system,Need a Building permit for that home improvement project, there is a bribe for that , politicians just call it a fee.Want to buy a car?that bribe is called a tax.
In most of the Arab World the bribe takers are not so subtle but the idea behind it is the same.

[S1m0n]

10:21 PM on 04/15/2010

How many in a row is that, now?

[YesMeeToo]

08:58 PM on 04/15/2010

Not surprised! Olmert has been in the news for this sort of stuff for a couple of years now. They should have Dubai do the investigation and the whole thing would be on tape!

[mamacat]

07:48 PM on 04/15/2010

Someone who steals land from Arabs is also guilty of stealing money from Israelis? Is there no honor among thieves?

[chedet]

03:31 AM on 04/16/2010

Nop.

[Ric NYC]

07:17 PM on 04/15/2010

Ouch!

"Israel placed No. 93 out of 175 countries on a 2009 international index of press freedom, released by Reporters Without Borders (RSF) on Tuesday.

The 2009 ranking meant Israeli lost its place as the top country for press freedom in the region, falling behind Kuwait at No. 60, Lebanon at No. 61 and the United Arab Emirates at No. 86."

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/1122370.html

[skialethia]

01:04 PM on 04/16/2010

And with the deportation of Malsin, the arrest of Kamm and the threats of kidnapping against Blau, Israel has probably dropped to just ahead of Iran by a point.

Then the hasbara crowd points fingers at Arab countries and tout freedom of the press in Israel, when the IDF censors the press.

[tallen]

06:25 PM on 04/17/2010

If you read the article, the only reason seems to be restrictions on the media having unfettered access to Gaza during the last Israeli operation there to stop the rain of rockets and mortars.

Seems sensible, since the risk to reporters is great and the world is all to ready to blame Israel when a war correspondent gets killed.

[bannedingaza]

07:03 PM on 04/15/2010

In a democracy..if he's guilty...put him in jail...in ALL the Arab States and in the illegal Arab territories...the leaders simply kill their accusers!

[hemara]

07:16 PM on 04/15/2010

Now how are you going to prove that? Exclamation marks don't make it so.

[bannedingaza]

09:00 PM on 04/15/2010

Well...there IS corruption in all these places...but NO accusers around to say anything! Or...do you DENY that,too?????????????????????????????/

[skialethia]

01:08 PM on 04/16/2010

Liiiiinnnnk!

[JerryLevy]

06:34 PM on 04/15/2010

The good news---at least there is one country in the Middle East where bribing government officials is illegal. Let's hope there will be more in the future.

[messy]

07:06 PM on 04/15/2010

Yup. I hope the sonofabitch goes to jail.

[bannedingaza]

09:01 PM on 04/15/2010

Can we at least until he is convicted,or doesn't that matter to you??

[Ric NYC]

03:42 PM on 04/15/2010

"Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, scheduled to speak at the Tuesday night banquet, must be looking forward to AIPAC; it may be the only place he can appear these days and be guaranteed an enthusiastic reception." The Jewish Week (2008) .

[Freenation]

02:51 PM on 04/15/2010

Well nothing new here he is not the first tainted politician and certainly will not be the last...

[phute]

03:05 PM on 04/15/2010

Goes on everywhere.
Deal with it instead of pointing out faults in other countries......jeeeez

[bannedingaza]

09:02 PM on 04/15/2010

I DID...above!

[CigarGod]

02:30 PM on 04/15/2010

The Economist ranks 167 countries for their various democratic components.
They classify them as:
Full Democracies.
Flawed Democracies.
Hybrid.
Authoritarian.

Israel ranks around 38, as a Flawed Democracy.
They rank below such countries as:
Spain
Czech Rep.
Uruquay
Mauritius
South Africa
Chile
and just one place above Botswana.

[TheLonelyGod]

03:00 PM on 04/15/2010

And this is related to the topic how again?

[CigarGod]

03:07 PM on 04/15/2010

Related: All the posts by the apologists saying what a full and robust democracy Israel has.

I guess you could call it as close to facts as we have had for much of this discussion.
Perspective.

[Rand]

04:39 PM on 04/15/2010

I didn't know that you and St.C ran the Brothers of Judea website!

I've been there and even commented

[lightningbolt]

03:06 PM on 04/15/2010

Expecting a country that is only 60 years old to be a perfect democracy is unrealistic. Democracy takes time to evolve.

[TAIsabel]

01:22 PM on 04/15/2010

Check this out today in the NY Times. A ray of hope but, I am afraid, that Bibi's latest actions reflect his desperation over what is now a whole new approach by the US:

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/15/world/middleeast/15mideast.html

[StCuthbert]

01:57 PM on 04/15/2010

I thought the NY Times was as evil as they come, crazy right wing, and owned by the Zionists?

[CigarGod]

02:18 PM on 04/15/2010

Any comment on the substance of the article?

[TAIsabel]

03:12 PM on 04/15/2010

Unlike you, I don't live my life under the cloud of paranoia and/or conspiracy theories.