Israeli PM vows to bring captured soldiers home

Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert promised today to bring home two soldiers captured by Hezbollah guerrillas.

“We will exhaust every effort to bring them home,” Mr Olmert said in a speech in the northern city of Haifa.

The July 12 abduction of the soldiers in a cross-border raid sparked a 34-day war against Hezbollah in Lebanon.

Mr Olmert has been criticised for accepting a UN-brokered ceasefire without winning the release of the soldiers.

He said today he accepted full responsibility for his government’s decision to go to war against Hezbollah guerrillas in Lebanon.

“The decision ... was entirely mine,” he said in the speech, where he addressed leaders of northern communities damaged by Hezbollah rocket fire.

He defended his decision to authorise a last-minute ground offensive in Lebanon, despite the heavy casualties suffered by Israeli forces.

Thirty-three soldiers were killed in the offensive, launched even as a ceasefire agreement was taking place. Mr Olmert said the offensive helped push the ceasefire through the United Nations.

While expressing sorrow for the heavy casualties, he said the offensive was “unavoidable.”

Mr Olmert’s government has been heavily criticised for its handling of the 34-day war.

Today he rejected a state inquiry into the government’s handling of the war, despite widespread calls for a broad, independent investigation.

Instead, he authorised a less powerful investigation to be headed by a former head of the Mossad spy agency. A state inquiry would have the authority to dismiss top officials.

In his speech, Mr Olmert said the government did not have the “luxury” to spend long periods of time investigating the past.

The decision is likely to generate heavy criticism. The public has been clamouring for a serious investigation into the war.

Hezbollah leader Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah said earlier that he would not have ordered the capture of two Israeli soldiers if he had known it would lead to the Lebanon war.

Guerillas from the Islamic militant group killed three Israeli soldiers and seized two more in a cross-border raid on July 12, which sparked 34 days of fighting that ended with a ceasefire on August 14.

“We did not think, even 1%, that the capture would lead to a war at this time and of this magnitude. You ask me, if I had known on July 11 ... that the operation would lead to such a war, would I do it? I say no, absolutely not,” he said in an interview with Lebanon’s New TV station.