Israeli general resigns over abducted soldiers

After the war in Iraq which, despite proving to have been fought on a totally false premise, has produced not a single resignation; there is something almost endearing about the way the Israelis are carving through their armed forces seeking to find culprits responsible for their humiliation at the hands of Hizbullah during the summer.

A second Israeli general has resigned as a consequence of this summer's Lebanon war. Brig-Gen Gal Hirsch, commander of a reserve division, quit under protest after he was severely criticised for failing to prevent the abduction of two of his men, Eldad Regev and Ehud Goldwasser, by Hizbollah on 12 July.

An inquiry, chaired by Doron Almog, a retired major-general, also criticised General Hirsch's leadership during the 34-day war, which Israel launched in response to the abductions. It called for his dismissal, but General Hirsch got his resignation in first.

I know that in the US Rumsfeld's head has been belatedly placed on the chopping board, but here in the UK we have the situation where we have illegally invaded another country looking for WMD that turned out not to exist and the only people to step down have been two members of the BBC and Piers Morgan, the editor of the Daily Mirror.

All three opposed the government's stance and all three paid the ultimate price for this. However, not a single member of the government has been forced to fall on his sword for a foreign policy debacle that is actually worse than Suez.

The Israelis are a more ruthless bunch by far. Talk of moving Hirsch sideways was quickly dismissed:

Lt-Gen Dan Halutz, the chief of staff, last month recommended moving General Hirsch to another senior post, but the appointment was frozen after it was challenged by Amir Peretz, the Defence Minister, who wanted him to be dismissed.

Here, in Britain, there hasn't even been talk of moving people sideways. Indeed, anyone who spoke of such a thing would probably be accused of "undermining the troops".

However, in Israel, there seems to be a genuine lust for accountability:

Major-General Udi Adam, General Hirsch's superior, resigned earlier as chief of northern command after being shunted aside during the war. The Almog report will add fuel to demands for more senior heads to roll. It also criticised the general staff's inadequate preparation for a possible war and its indecisiveness during the campaign. General Halutz rejected some of the findings during a five-hour meeting with General Almog yesterday and urged General Hirsch to reconsider.

In his letter, General Hirsch hinted that the chief of staff should stand down. "It would be right," he wrote, "to conclude that concrete responsibility for the errors, the false steps and the failures fall not only on the forward units and their commanders. There is responsibility that truly should be taken by senior echelons."

Hirsch is hinting that Olmert and others should pay the ultimate price, and it is hard to fault his logic. Indeed, the Israeli public have lost all faith in Olmert as their leader:

Israelis, disappointed by the failure to bring the abducted soldiers home and to disarm Hizbollah, have lost faith in the political and the military leadership. A Tel-Aviv University poll last week found only 6 per cent trusting Ehud Olmert, the Prime Minister, with their security and 2 per cent trusting Mr Peretz.

These are startlingly low figures. I have said since the end of the Israeli-Lebanon war that I am amazed that Olmert has managed to stay at his post. However, there are at least rumblings of discontent in the Israeli ranks.

In the US and UK, both Bush and Blair have never faced any serious calls for their resignations, despite the fact that they both got us into war on a totally false prospectus. However, the notion of honourable resignation seems to have ended in the UK when Carrington resigned after the Argentineans invaded the Falklands.

Since then, the only resignations have been from people who opposed war.

Olmert may yet pay the price for his folly, but Blair and Bush never will. And this is a system of government that is so good that we want to export it across the globe?

This actually proves that Bush and Blair have a point when they say that history will be their final judges; for, in both cases, their respective seats of government never even seriously questioned whether either man should pay the ultimate political price.

What does this say about our system of government?

tag: Bush, Blair, Iraq war, war on terror, Olmert, Israel, resignation, Lebanon,