This is some of what Ruth Matar of the Women in Green organization wrote before the elections, when she urged people not to vote for Ehud Olmert and the Kadima Party.

Ehud Olmert boasts that he is the one who convinced Ariel Sharon to disengage from the Jewish Land of Gaza, and to make Gaza "judenrein." From Olmert's point of view the disengagement was a great success. There is not a single Jew left in Gaza! Even dead Jews had to be removed from their graves and buried elsewhere, to satisfy the Arab enemy.

Half-a-year after the Gaza pullout, there is no avoiding the decisive conclusion that disengagement was a tragic, pre-ordained failure. This is true with respect to every possible issue:

Politically: The terror group HAMAS won the election! "More than 80% of the Palestinians view the pullout as a victory for the armed struggle," said Palestinian pollster Khalil Shikaki.

Economically: The costs associated with implementing Disengagement, and dealing with the repercussions, are massive. Residents in communities near Gaza, who are now the new victims of Qassam rocket attacks, are demanding reinforced homes. Also, previously productive and independent people, who have been expelled from their homes and have no jobs, are not able to provide for their families. They now require that food and shelter be furnished by the State.

Renewed Terror Threats: Defense Minister Mofaz admitted to the Jerusalem Post on Tuesday that Al-Qaida cells were operating in the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) and were planning attacks against Israel. Iran transferred $1.8 million to Islamic Jihad. On Tuesday a suicide bombing in the center of the country was narrowly avoided, after a high-speed chase by the police on the Jerusalem-Tel Aviv highway.

Security: Qassam rocket attacks from evacuated areas have escalated. The rain of rockets on Israeli cities and population centers have increased, reaching the outskirts of Ashkelon, with its wide range of essential strategic installations.

National infrastructures in Ashkelon include:

1. The Rotenberg Power Plant in southern Ashkelon is Israel's second-largest electric station, and supplies about a quarter of the country's electricity.

2. The Eilat Ashkelon Pipeline company (EAPC) in Ashkelon operates three oil pipelines linking Ashkelon with Eilat, Ashdod and Haifa.

3. The Ashkelon seawater reverse osmosis (SWRO) plant, the largest desalination plant of its kind in the world, is set to ultimately provide an annual 100 million cubic meters of water, or some 15% of the country's domestic consumer demand. It commenced initial production in August 2005, and began operations at a third of its full capacity.

Shouldn't the Olmert Interim Government be held accountable for failing to protect Ashkelon, Sderot, and Negev settlements and kibbutzim?

[Ehud Olmert's] statements imply turning most of Judea and Samaria over to Hamas, and thus bringing Arab terrorism that much closer to Israel's population centers. But, incredibly, Olmert plans to leave a continual Israeli military presence in the area that has been cleared of all Jews!

According to Olmert, therefore, Jews will not be allowed to live in their Biblical heartland of Judea and Samaria. However, Olmert plans that the Israel Defense Forces will remain to continue Israel's military rule of the Arabs who live there!

Has the man taken leave of his senses? Is the IDF staying there to protect the Arabs in Judea and Samaria? What is the function of the IDF, in a judenrein Judea and Samaria? And won't our Army be exposed to terror attacks from Hamas And Islamic Jihad?

Unless we Jews are able to prevent Olmert's holding on to power, he might soon be making life and death decisions affecting ordinary Israelis. He will demand sacrifices, but he sure won't demand sacrifices from himself and his own family.

PBS ran a puff piece on Olmert just after the election, where these facts about Olmert's family life were given -- but in a context that blurred their importance. Olmert was portrayed as a wrong-headed Right-winger who was shown the light by his Leftist family, whose opinion were clearly influenced by their Leftist mother, not by their father. Ruth Matar put these aspects of Olmert's personal life into meaningful context.

Both of his sons reside abroad. Shaul, an adherent of Yesh Gvul (an organization which refuses to serve in Judea and Samaria) was charged with desertion and now lives in New York. Ariel who never did any army service resides in Paris. Olmert, if elected, might soon be exposing other youth in uniform to perils to which his own sons are spared! His daughter, a Machsom Watch activist, will meanwhile interfere with the duties of soldiers manning checkpoints to prevent terrorists from carrying out their plans.

And she pointed out why Olmert should not have been appointed acting Prime Minister and allowed to make decisions like his sending police into Amona to bash heads and crush testicles. She asked if Ehud Olmert was a legitimate candidate for Prime Minister?

In Israel the vote is for the party, not the person. That is the system. Therefore Olmert should not have been allowed to be the acting Prime Minister, since his Party, Kadima, is not the one which won the previous election. Actually, it did not even exist at that time. The Acting Prime Minister should have been selected from the Likud Party.

Following the massive stroke of Sharon in January, Attorney General Mazuz defined his condition as "temporary incapacity of a permanent character."

Mazuz had good reason to act as he did. If he had simply declared that Sharon was permanently incapacitated, (which he definitely is) then a complicated, multi-step procedure for selecting and approving a new Prime Minister and Government would have been set in motion. So Mazuz invented a new legal category, which, of course, us simple folks are not able to understand! In so doing, he seized the power to select the Prime Minister from Israel's elected officials, effectively anointing himself the Prime Minister's sole elector.

In the aftermath of these twin hits -- the Arabs determinedly pursuing the death of the Jews and the Jews glubbering in denial that the danger is so severe -- we can only shake our head in wonderment that we Jews have lasted this long. Fortunately, our essayists are made of sterner stuff.

There's some sun coming out despite the clouds. Despite the pollyanna-ishness of much of the mainstream media, more and more of the people of the world are beginning to understand we have a global problem: the leaders of Islam have declared war on us all. And even some in the media are beginning to think.