In January 2011, the news media released sections from a memoir written by former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert. The publicized text — the book was never published — dealt with the advanced negotiations Olmert held with Palestinian Authority (PA) President Mahmoud Abbas, in series of secret tête-à-têtes that were held in Olmert’s Jerusalem home.
The year was 2008. Olmert was an unpopular prime minister after the Winograd Commission’s report pointed out his failures in the Second Lebanon War, and the police investigation in the Talansky affair and associated envelopes of money lent him the aura of someone involved in corruption. But behind closed doors, Olmert advanced a peace agreement with the Palestinians in a way that no previous Israeli prime minister had ever done. He was focused, he was adamant and he was determined to go the whole nine yards.
