Israel's Olmert admits taking cash, won’t quit

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert
admitted on Thursday taking cash
from a U.S. businessman but resisted
calls to resign over a police
investigation into alleged hefty
bribes over almost a decade.

As Israelis enjoyed festivities marking their 60 years
of Murder and Mayhem, police lifted a week-old media gag
order and announced details of accusations that sparked
opposition calls for Olmert to quit.

He said he would resign only if he were formally indicted.

Whether he goes or not, doubt over his future is likely to upset
his faltering, U.S.-sponsored peace negotiations with the
Palestinians and will cast a heavy cloud over next week's
celebratory visit to Israel by U.S. President George W. Bush.

The White House said Bush still intended to make the trip.

In a effort to try and convince the people of no wrong doing
Olmert appeared in a late-night televised address saying
he did nothing wrong.

Israelis are no strangers to tales of corruption in this make believe
democracy and the latest case may fuel calls for an overhaul
of political funding rules.

String of investigations

Olmert, who was questioned by police for an hour last Friday,
has weathered a string of investigations since he succeeded
Ariel Sharon as prime minister in 2006. Sharon's son is in jail
for campaign funding misdeeds on his father's behalf.

On Thursday, Olmert said all the cash he received --
put at hundreds of thousands of dollars by one judicial source
-- was legitimate support from New York financier Morris
Talansky to fund various election campaigns over nearly
a decade from 1993.

Olmert has made the claim that if the attorney general decides to
file an indictment against him he will resign."

American 'helped me cover deficits'

In a terse six-minute address, Olmert said Talansky funded his
two successful campaigns for mayor of Jerusalem in 1993
and 1998, an unsuccessful bid to lead the right-wing
Likud party in 1999 and a further internal Likud election
in 2002. He also said the American "helped me cover deficits"
after elections.

Earlier, a police statement said:
"The investigation deals with suspicions that the prime minister
received significant sums of money from a foreigner or number
of foreign individuals over an extended period of time."

A police spokesman named Talansky as a key witness, along
with Olmert's long-time secretary Shula Zaken, who has been
under house arrest, and his former law partner Uri Messer.

One police source said investigators cracked coded notes kept
by Zaken that they suspect recorded sums given by Talansky
-- referred to in some of the jottings as "The Laundry Man."

Gideon Sahar, an ally of Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu,
said: "Olmert is unworthy and cannot carry on in his post.
The Kadima government is sunk up to its neck in corruption."

There was no immediate comment from Livni or from
Defense Minister Ehud Barak, leader of Olmert's main
coalition partner the Labour party. Barak is under pressure
from some Labour members to bolt the alliance, but others in
the party fear that would trigger an election which
Netanyahu could win with ease.