Israel to free jailed ex-PM

– A parole committee has decided to grant early release to Israeli ex-prime minister Ehud Olmert, who is serving a 27-month prison sentence for corruption, his lawyer said yesterday.

“The committee accepted all our arguments,” Olmert’s lawyer Shani Illouz told public radio. “As of now, Olmert will be released on Sunday,” she said, noting the justice ministry could still appeal the decision.

The 71-year-old Olmert, who was premier between 2006 and 2009, was convicted of graft and was jailed in February 2016. He has completed two-thirds of his sentence.

The committee’s reasons for granting his early release were not immediately clear, with a statement expected later.

Olmert is Israel’s first former premier to serve jail time. Olmert won international acclaim for relaunching peace efforts with the Palestinians at the Annapolis conference in the US in 2007, but they failed to bear fruit and the corruption charges against him have come to define his legacy.

The parole committee’s decision comes after he was rushed to hospital with chest pains. A picture of a gaunt Olmert in hospital robes eating from plastic utensils found its way to social media, evoking a wave of sympathy from the public as well as politicians calling for his early release. –

Jerusalem