Ex-Israeli PM Ehud Olmert sentenced

JERUSALEM -- Former Prime Minister Ehud Olmert was sentenced yesterday to a suspended one-year jail term and a $20,000 fine in the high-profile corruption case that drove him from office nearly four years ago.

Olmert was convicted in July of breaching public trust for using his previous position as trade minister to help a business associate. But an Israeli court cleared him of the most serious charges in the case, including fraud, double-billing for travel expenses and concealing large cash gifts.

Olmert and his supporters praised the sentence, which fell short of prosecutors' call for six months of community service. The lighter sentence clears the way for Olmert to return to politics, if he wishes, though he is still fighting an indictment in a separate bribery case involving a real estate deal during his tenure as Jerusalem mayor.

Some of the former Kadima Party chairman's backers are urging Olmert to run again for a seat in the Knesset and challenge Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Had the court found Olmert guilty of "moral turpitude" or sentenced him to more than three months in jail, he would have been barred legally from serving in the Knesset for seven years.

Olmert has shrugged off questions about his political future, though he called the court's ruling and sentence a vindication. He had long characterized the corruption case against him as a political witch hunt. Emerging from court yesterday, a smiling Olmert said he left "with my head held high."

Jerusalem District Court Judge Musya Arad called Olmert's actions "a grave crime, not a procedural error." But she noted that the suspended jail sentence was sufficient because the case had already cost Olmert his job as prime minister.

Olmert originally was charged with accepting cash-stuffed envelopes from American businessman Morris Talansky, double-billing for travel expenses abroad and steering government contracts and grants to supporters. He could have faced five years in prison, if convicted of the more serious charges, which involved several hundred thousand dollars.

Olmert is Israel's first former prime minister to be convicted of a criminal offense.