The head of Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak's office, Haim Mendel-Shaked, resigned on Monday after issuing a stinging criticism of the beleaguered leader's ability to govern.
"The Prime Minister accepted Mendel-Shaked's request to end his term in office immediately," a spokeswoman for Barak told AFP.
It is the latest internal crisis to hit Barak's administration, which came under fire earlier this month when the Prime Minister sacked a number of top diplomats following the resignation of foreign minister David Levy.
Barak's government has been hobbling along without a parliamentary majority since early July because of dissent over his peace policies with the Palestinians.
The right-wing Likud party, the largest opposition bloc, said Barak himself should now resign.
"Barak must admit that he failed and resign," Danny Naveh, a leading Likud member was quoted as saying by Israeli public radio.
Mendel-Shaked resigned abruptly following the publication of an interview with the top-selling Israeli newspaper Yediot Aharonot Monday in which he accused Barak of not functioning as a prime minister and becoming his own bureau chief.
"Barak is now driving on the rims of his tires: the air has gone out of his tires. Nonetheless, he insists on continuing to drive, with determination, with panic," Yediot commented.
"In a war, he says, when they shoot your tires, you drive on whatever you have," the newspaper said.
Mendel-Shaked has known Barak for 15 years, serving under him when he was army chief of staff and head of military intelligence.
Mendel-Shaked's deputy, Shimon Batat, who resigned last week, complained in an interview with the rival Hebrew newspaper Maariv on Friday that Barak was turning the country into a "banana republic."
"(Barak) looks today like the commander of an anti-aircraft unit in the Afghan freedom-fighters army," said Batat, who like both Barak and Mendel-Shaked served in the army's elite Matkal unit. "Everyone around him is in despair."
Barak's military secretary Danny Eisenkot is also planning to leave, while his top political adviser Zvi Stauber is fleeing to become Israel's next ambassador in London, officials in the prime minister's office told AFP - OCCUPIED JERUSALEM (AFP)
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