MK Zevulun Orlev (Jewish Home), who established the committee, slammed Olmert's testimony as “a disgrace to Israeli democracy.”
by Maayana Miskin Elul 20, 5769 / September 9, '09 http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/133350
(IsraelNN.com) Former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert angered government expulsion victims Wednesday morning by blaming former Jewish residents of Gaza and northern Samaria for their own plight. Testifying before a Knesset committee working on behalf of Jews expelled during the 2005 “Disengagement,” Olmert defended expulsion as “the right thing at the right time,” and accused expellees of bearing responsibility for their own plight thanks to “misplaced hope.”
MK Zevulun Orlev (Jewish Home), who established the committee, slammed Olmert's testimony as “a disgrace to Israeli democracy.”
"Putting blame on the expellees themselves is a malicious and evil libel,” MK Orlev said. Olmert was wrong in blaming rabbis who encouraged “false hope” for telling Jewish residents of Gaza not to prepare for expulsion, he said, pointing out that the Jews who prepared for expulsion were left homeless and unemployed.
“It's a known fact that those who cooperated with the government prior to the expulsion, particularly the farmers, are in an even worse situation than the rest,” he said.
Former residents of Gush Katif also accused Olmert of attempting to shift blame. “He who bears the most blame for failing to rehabilitate residents of Gush Katif spent two and a half hours placing blame in a contemptible fashion, blaming the treasury, Members of Knesset, legal advisors, rabbis and the residents themselves, forgetting only himself,” stated the Gush Katif Residents' Committee.
Ketzaleh: Olmert, Do Teshuva
MK Yaakov “Ketzaleh” Katz (National Union) urged Olmert to repent prior to Rosh HaShanah, the day on which according to Jewish tradition all beings are judged for their actions over the past year. The Hebrew month of Elul is known as a month of tshuva (repentance), he noted.
"Instead of rubbing salt in the wounds of his own victims, Olmert should take the month of Elul to express regret for his horrible crimes four years ago,” MK Ketzaleh said.
Olmert's attempts to blame others will fail, and the Jewish people will remember him as bearing responsibility for the results of the Disengagement, said Ketzaleh. “The people of Israel live, and just as they did not forget those who expelled them from England, France, Austria and Spain, so too they shall not forget what Olmert and his partners did in destroying Gush Katif, expelling its 10,000 Jews and burning its synagogues.”
"Olmert is currently on trial for minor crimes,” he continued, referring to an indictment accusing Olmert of double-billing Jewish groups in order to pay for private travel expenses. “But when the day comes that Hebrew law is once again the law of the Jewish state, the People of Israel will put Olmert on trial for far more serious crimes.”
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