I mentioned on May 1 that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert would be driven from office because of his government's mismanagement of last summer's Lebanon war, a prediction I first made on Aug. 11. In the August post I also predicted former PM Benjamin Netanyahu would re-assume the office, which in the months since then has seemed like a real long shot.

But maybe not any longer. Israeli reporter Shmuel Rosner, writing in Slate, asks what comes next for the embattled Olmert government and Israel's future in the wake of the Winograd report, which harshly criticized Olmert et. al. for their bungling on the war.

Three possible outcomes can be imagined, since the demand—from both the public and from fellow politicians—that Olmert should resign is getting hard to ignore:

1. Olmert is forced out, the ruling coalition dismantles, and a date for new elections—probably this fall—is set. In the meantime, an interim government, headed by another coalition member—perhaps the tireless Shimon Peres or Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni—is established.

2. Olmert is replaced by someone else from his coalition, without a date for new elections. No one believes such a coalition could survive for very long.

3. Olmert survives as the coalition partners eventually reach the conclusion that they will lose power if new elections are called.

New elections would give Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu a chance to become prime minister again, since he is leading in all polls. ...

Still not the most likely outcome, but one that can't be held as unlikely any more.