At the time, he was working for the City of Jerusalem as a municipal sanitation inspector.

A guard at the gate, a shop steward here, an assistant sanitation inspector there, all of whose friendship was necessary if you sold hot dogs from an open truck.

The report on the two-year inquiry, by the city's Investigation Department said undercover agents had worked as truckers, retailers and sanitation inspectors.

He said that most were union members, including all the carpenters and electricians, and that no violations had been cited during recent visits by fire, buildings and sanitation inspectors.

Whatever the pigeons or rats do not eat is noted by stern sanitation inspectors, who issue us summonses (typically $100 fines) for failing to keep the sidewalk clean.

A sanitation inspector is mistaken for an international spy.

When a coalition on the city council elected him mayor in 1965, he went to Jerusalem's best tailor and ordered smart olive-green uniforms for the sanitation inspectors.

So any talk of cleaning up the city tends to get attention, even when it comes from a sanitation inspector worried about raising his family on junk-strewn streets.

The kitchen would have passed a white-glove inspection by the most diligent of sanitation inspectors.

And on Sept. 7 sanitation inspectors found mud on carrots and onions on a cutting board, 20 rotten melons and numerous other violations.