Israel Matzav

Gaydamak puts Olmert in his place

Arkadi Gaydamak, the billionaire who has been sending the children of Sderot to Eilat, put Prime Minister Ehud Olmert in his place in an interview with Army Radio this morning:

"It is a joke to speak of this man as prime minister, and as a man for me his is nothing," Gaydamak said in heavily accented English on a phone interview from Moscow.

"Olmert says the residents of Sderot don't need to get out of the range of the bombs - to who is he deflecting the responsibility for these children? And instead of thanking me for caring for the children of Israel, this man who doesn't have any respect from me criticizes me."

"I took into account the expected ramifications, but it was something that I felt was required to do - I am a normal person, and when you are talking about protecting children from danger, money in not an obstacle," Gaydamak said.

...

Gaydamak, who made headlines for spending a share of his fortune to help people in the North during the war in Lebanon and now to help Sderot residents, said this weekend that if he tried, he could become prime minister of Israel.

"I have enough public support today to be elected prime minister with a large majority," Gaydamak told Yediot Aharonot . "If I decide to run, I will get 40 seats in the Knesset. Politicians know that and they are scared."

As well they might be. In a recent poll conducted by The Israel Center for Youth Leadership, youths aged 14-30 named Gaydamak the second most influential non-political figure in Israel today. When Gaydamak, who owns the Betar Jerusalem soccer team, arrives at his team's games, he is greeted by the popular chant: "Hey there, look who's here, the next prime minister of Israel!"

...

"The prime minister is concerned that I will steal votes from him if an election will be held," he said. "For the politicians, the people of Sderot are just votes. The prime minister doesn't care about Sderot or the pressure the children there suffer from."

I don't know if I would vote for him, but he sure has Olmert pegged.

posted by Carl in Jerusalem @ 6:12 PM