"For years he said that the minute the report of the State
Comptroller is published he will be cleared -- but he was not
cleared," said Minister of Justice Tzachi Hanegbi in response
to the publication of State Comptroller Eliezer Goldberg's
report about the tragedy of the 1992 Tze'elim training
accident.
On the other hand, Labor Party leader Ehud Barak said, "The
blood libel which has been carried out against me these past
years as a man and as a chief of General Staff is now
over."
The Facts of the Report
The report makes five main points: 1] Then Chief of Staff
Ehud Barak did not flee the scene of the 1992 Tze'elim
training accident; 2] that Barak and other senior officers
had no responsibility for the accident; 3] But Goldberg said
he could not draw any conclusions about Barak failing to lend
a hand to the wounded or respond to calls for help, due to
conflicting testimony by witnesses. In addition, the
comptroller said that 4] there was a lack of clarity about
the chain of command for the training exercise which was the
fault of Barak, but that did not make him responsible for the
accident; 5] there was no evidence whatsoever of tampering
with the evidence nor of any cover-up.
The Facts of the Accident
The accident occurred in the course of a training rehearsal
of an elite combat unit that was planning an attack that
involved the firing of a missile. The particular incident was
viewed by the Chief of Staff and a whole array of the upper
echelons of the army. Various reports have appeared in the
foreign press about the ultimate target of the planning, but
Israel has never confirmed anything. Twenty percent of the
report remains secret, and that presumably includes the real
target. A full list of all those present has also not been
made public for security reasons.
The schedule of the exercise originally called for the Chief
of Staff to arrive at 6:15 a.m. and to leave at 8 a.m. on the
morning of June 15, 1992. Later this was moved up by about an
hour, but there was uncertainty on the part of many of those
involved about the exact timing.
The Chief of Staff did arrive at 5:20 a.m. A live missile was
fired at 6:15 a.m., before all the soldiers had left the
target area. Five were killed and six wounded. At 6:47, the
first medical helicopter landed at the scene, and a few
minutes later the Chief of Staff landed in his helicopter,
which was a passenger aircraft and unsuitable for
transporting wounded. At around 7, the second medical
helicopter arrived.
The first medical helicopter took off at 7:25, and the second
one within ten minutes. The Chief of Staff left around that
time. "It is certain that the Chief of Staff did not leave
before both medical helicopters had landed. That is, he
remained on the scene for at least 45 minutes after the
accident, when there were five doctors and at least nine
paramedics who were treating the wounded, in addition to
enough medical helicopters to deal with the number of
wounded." In any case, he said, even if Barak did leave the
scene before the two evacuation helicopters, his helicopter
could not have helped in the evacuation since it was not
suited to the transport of the injured.
The open issue was the conduct of Barak while on the ground
after the tragedy. According to the testimony of some of the
wounded, published in a 1995 Yediot Acharonot report,
many of those present helped, including the deputy Chief of
Staff and other senior officers, but Barak stood in place
with his arms folded.
The Goldberg report included a statement by former state
comptroller Miriam Ben-Porat, who noted to the Knesset State
Control Committee that in the 1992 Military Police
investigation which questioned all of the wounded, no one
complained that the injured had been abandoned or that they
had received poor medical treatment.
Comparing the testimony of Barak and the wounded soldiers,
Ben-Porat concluded: "We have, therefore, contradicting
testimony." As a result Ben-Porat decided not to relate to
the issue, for the lack of suitable means, as comptroller, to
conduct an appropriate investigation.
Barak said that from the first moment after the accident, two
or three people were attending to each of the wounded, while
he was overseeing operations to ensure that additional
difficulties did not occur.
The Reactions
In the report, Goldberg determined that "there is no place to
say that the chief of General Staff left the site in haste"
before the wounded were treated. Even if he left before they
were all evacuated, "there is still no reason to say that he
thus prevented the saving of the life of anyone."
On Monday Hanegbi said that he had been waiting the whole
week to respond, since he did not want to leak any
information before the official publication. Then he
responded very sharply.
"The comptroller did not dismiss or deny the complaints of
the wounded that, at the moment of truth, the man who should
have had the greatest moral responsibility and who should
have done the most to help them, did not even bother to bend
down to them, to lend a helping hand. Even Yossi Sarid said
that he cannot escape the impression that the Chief of Staff
was already preoccupied by the question of how he can
extricate himself from the mud, and he said `Ehud fled.'
"I have no doubt that the rescue of the wounded was not
affected. All of the facts about the evacuation helicopters
were already documented in the report of Yediot
Acharonot and no one charged -- and certainly not I --
that any life was chas vechalila lost because he left
the site. . . .
"The serious moral stain on Barak in my opinion remains --
and Ehud Barak would do well to admit that he was in shock.
It would have happened to anyone. I was never in such a
situation and it could be that I would be in ten times as
great a shock. . . . But his name was not cleared and he
cynically continues to claim that he was the greatest Chief
of Staff.
"I have no doubt that he did not do it deliberately. . . .
But to ask others to take account of their actions is a moral
failing of the first order. I call upon Ehud Barak to
withdraw his candidacy. He is not fit to be a leader."
Labor Party candidate for prime minister Ehud Barak responded
to the report by saying there is "not a grain of truth" to
the accusations against him and the IDF senior staff. "It's
good that the state comptroller agreed to put an end to this
web of fabrications," he said at a news conference convened
shortly after the report was released. He said that there
were two or three people attending to each of the wounded
from the start. He added that he is not waiting for an
apology from any politicians, whom he said have tried to make
cynical use of victims as a political tool.
The official Likud response to the report and the sharp
comments of the Justice Minister was that the latter spoke
only for himself, and inappropriately. "The Likud calls for
taking the IDF out of politics and letting the subject
lapse."
Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu, on a tour of the Jordan
Valley, said the report "contains a series of questions," and
called on the public to read it on their own and draw their
own conclusions.
In the report, Goldberg also clears all of those investigated
in the accident from obstruction of justice, including
accusations they had coordinated testimony or that the
training area had been cleared of evidence. He also said
there was no evidence of people being promoted to buy their
silence. He was referring among others to Maj.-Gen. Amiram
Levine, who was promoted after the accident to OC Northern
Command.
Regarding safety procedures, Goldberg determined they were
not implemented properly by the unit commander. In concluding
the report, the comptroller emphasized the need to improve
and renew security procedures in the IDF, and ensure that
instructions are clear.
Goldberg condemned the leaks of the report. "Our tradition is
to leak everything, and this phenomenon is unacceptable and
must be uprooted," he said.
