MK Ophir Pines-Paz requested Attorney-General Menachem Mazuz to launch an investigation of Prime Minister Ehud Olmert’s attempt to place his close confidant Yedidya Ya’ari onto the Winograd Commission.

Ya’ari, Chairman of RAFAEL, the Armaments Development Authority, was one of a small number of people that Olmert unofficially consulted with on the eve of the war. Mazuz originally disqualified Ya’ari because he is considered a subordinate of the Defense Minister, whose behavior was being investigated as part of the Winograd Commission’s mandate. Pines-Paz contends that the very recommendation of Ya’ari for the panel was a violation of public trust.