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Occupied Jerusalem: Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert faced calls to resign on Friday after he admitted taking cash from a businessman in the middle of a police investigation into suspected bribery.
The Maariv tabloid quoted legal sources who said Olmert took hundreds of thousands of dollars from a New York financier tagged "The Laundry Man" in coded records.
Olmert has said he would only resign if the attorney general could produce sufficient evidence to indict him.
The right-wing opposition Likud party is calling for a snap election. Likud MP Yuval Steinitz said Olmert no longer has “public legitimacy, no moral legitimacy."
Shelly Yecimovitch, a member of Olmert's main coalition partner Labour Party, also called on Olmert to resign.
Yecimovitch said Olmert had "proved beyond any shadow of a doubt he cannot distinguish between being a suspect and being a prime minister."
Olmert has defended himself against a handful of other inquiries since he became prime minister in 2006. His son is currently in jail for raising secret funds for his campaign.
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