Katsav's problem

President Katsav is on the verge of being indicted by the police for sexual offences. After months of collecting evidence and then the Attorney General Meni Mazuz reviewing the evidence, he finally declared that there is a case to answer, and Pres. Katsav is being charged. The offences occured before he was elected President, but should have been detected in any pre-election investigation. Until now 10 women have come forward and accused him of sexual offences while they worked for him or were in the same offices. But, of course, he is innocent until proven guilty in a court of law.
Five of the cases cannot be considered because they were before the statute of limitations ran out on them. But, the five other cases are apparently enough to charge him. The latest of the cases is the most serious since it involves a charge of rape. However, there is some question about one of the women, who had a previous case of extortion and apparently tried to blackmail Katsav. This is how the case became known, because Katsav recorded her threats, and then gave them to the police. However, they had to investigate her accusations too, and the whole case was revealed. There may be a case against this woman, who is known as "aleph" since her identity cannot yet be revealed.
Because of this situation, Katsav is in a very embarrassing position. He declares his innocence, but some (female) lawmakers have threatened to introduce a bill to impeach him. This was retracted when Katsav decided not to attend the opening of the winter session of the Knesset that he usually presides over. However, he will not resign until he is actually indicted.
As far as replacements go, the following have been mentioned: Dep. PM Peres, who was beaten last time by Katsav and will probably not run again, MK Reuven Rivlin of Likud, Amnon Rubinstein, former Atty. Gen. and Head of the Herzliya Interdisciplinary Center, who has said he is not interested, MK Colette Avital of Labor, who wants to be the first female President, former Chief Rabbi Menachem Lau, who is quite popular, but many do not want an Orthodox President, Elie Weisel, who is an outsider, Natan Sharansky, who just (conveniently) resigned his place in the Knesset, but is now Head of the Shalem Center in Jerusalem, a right wing think tank. There may be others hiding in the wings. PM Olmert has not declared his favorite candidate yet.
It's unfortunate that such embarrasing things happen to such apparently nice and modest politicians. But, we saw it with Pres. Bill Clinton and many others. It is a feature of the job. Let's hope they find someone trustworthy next time, and investigate them thoroughly to make sure there are no skeletons hiding in the closet.