Ehud Olmert said Israel was implementing changes based on the hard lessons of the Second Lebanon War.
In his first public comments on the final report of the Winograd Commission, which was released Jan. 30 and delivered harsh conclusions about the 2006 offensive against Lebanon’s Hezbollah, the Israeli prime minister made clear Sunday he is looking ahead. He also shrugged off calls from critics to resign.
“The report is not a source of joy; there was none anywhere, certainly not with me. It is an opportunity to correct things that were revealed, to improve them, to rebuild where necessary and to lead the State of Israel forward so that it will be properly prepared in all security, social and diplomatic areas to deal with the challenges that it must face,” Olmert told his Cabinet in broadcast remarks.
“As the report clearly states: There were achievements alongside the failures and important successes for the State of Israel alongside the failures. We must neither exaggerate the achievements nor understate the failures. Rather, we must treat them with all due seriousness and gravity. We must constantly remember that there are those who paid an unbearably heavy personal price that they will have to live with always.”
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