* A senior lawmaker from Ehud Olmert’s party resigned to protest the Israeli prime minister’s refusal to step down over the Second Lebanon War.
Avigdor Yitzhaki announced Thursday he was abandoning politics as an “ideological decision” after Olmert said he was staying on despite the censure of the Winograd Commission of inquiry’s final report on the 2006 offensive against Lebanese Hezbollah guerrillas.
Yitzhaki was considered a stalwart of Olmert’s Kadima party, but he quit as faction head when the Winograd Commission handed in an interim report last April.
His departure ironically helps Olmert, as Yitzhaki had threatened to vote against the government when no-confidence motions are submitted in the Knesset.
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