Israel's army, legislature battle over Lebanon war

JERUSALEM, Mar 5 (Reuters) A rare court battle pitting Israel's armed forces against its legislature erupted today over a probe into last year's Lebanon war that could be critical of the military and Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's government.

The general heading the Home Front Command asked the High Court to stop a parliamentary committee from meeting tomorrow to hear an interim report by the government's main watchdog into civil defence activities during the 34-day conflict.

The findings of the investigation conducted by the State Comptroller's Office could set the bar for a separate government-appointed commission examining the way the military and Olmert's cabinet conducted the inconclusive war.

Lebanon's Hezbollah guerrillas fired thousands of rockets into Israel in the July/August war, forcing more than a million people to take to bomb shelters and many to rely on food deliveries by the army.

State Comptroller Micha Lindenstrauss investigated complaints the shelters were not adequately prepared and military and civilian authorities failed to cater for the needs of a populace under daily fire.

Petitioning the court, Major-General Gershon Yitzhak, the Home Front chief, argued the session of parliament's State Control Committee must be delayed until he can study and respond to the preliminary report, delivered to the military today.

The court scheduled a hearing for Tuesday, just two hours before the committee is to meet.

Committee chairman Zevulun Orlev of the opposition National Religious Party has insisted the session go ahead as planned and said it would not deal with assigning individual blame.

OLMERT ACCUSATIONS Olmert was not a party to the legal papers filed by the chief military defence attorney and Yitzhak's personal lawyer but the prime minister made a similar argument today.

In the letter to the parliament speaker's bureau, Olmert accused the comptroller's office of failing to solicit a government response before publishing its findings.

''I see no room'' for plans to release it at a parliament committee meeting tomorrow, Olmert wrote.

The state comptroller had demanded that Olmert appear before him and a team of investigators to answer questions in the probe. Olmert has refused, saying it would be unprecedented for an Israeli prime minister to do so.

Olmert also said Lindenstrauss had delayed sending him a list of questions and failed to give him enough time to submit comprehensive written replies. The comptroller, in a statement, accused Olmert of foot-dragging.

Israeli political commentator Shimon Shiffer, writing in the Yedioth Ahronoth newspaper, quoted Olmert's ''inner circle'' as saying the prime minister had decided to stand up to Lindenstrauss and dissuade him of ''any visions of grandeur''.

The comptroller has been examining the terms of sale of Olmert's house in Jerusalem in 2004, his role in the 2005 privatisation of an Israeli bank and appointments he made to a state-funded business authority three years ago while industry and trade minister.

Olmert has denied any wrongdoing.

His political future could hang on those investigations and the results of the more wide-ranging Lebanon war probe launched by the Winograd commission of jurists, whose preliminary report is widely expected to be released within weeks.

REUTERS SP LS KP2336