With the recommendation of Israel’s police to indict Prime Minister Olmert on corruption charges, and the approaching primaries in Mr. Olmert’s Kadima party that are now barely a week away, it seems an increasingly safe bet that the next prime minister of Israel will be the country’s foreign minister and deputy prime minister, Tsipi Livni. (Or Tsipora Livni, to call her by her given name, though she prefers to go by her Israeli nickname)

Although Mr. Olmert has been clinging to his office like a rock climber to a last belay, he will not be able to ignore his own promise to resign when and if a formal indictment against him is filed, which will almost certainly be done after the Jewish holidays are over in early October.