A government-appointed committee examining Israel’s failures during the war in Lebanon last summer says it will publish an interim report in mid- to late April apportioning responsibility to top officials, heightening uncertainty about the future of the beleaguered prime minister, Ehud Olmert, and his government.

The committee, led by a retired judge, Eliyahu Winograd, announced its intention on Tuesday, saying the report would include “individual conclusions pertaining to the personal responsibility of the prime minister, the defense minister and the army chief of staff.”

That set off a flurry of debate about the possibility that the government would not serve out its term, scheduled to run three more years. Lt. Gen. Dan Halutz, the wartime chief of staff, resigned in January.

In Gaza, after meetings between the Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, of Fatah, and the prime minister, Ismail Haniya, of Hamas, each side said that the new unity government would be unveiled by Thursday and that it would be put to a vote of confidence in the Palestinian parliament on Saturday. Palestinian news media reported that the thorny issue of who would be interior minister, a post that controls several security apparatuses, had been resolved. Media reports said he is Hani Kawasmi, a civil servant in the Interior Ministry who belongs to neither party.

Also on Wednesday, Reuters said that a nonbinding report by experts from the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization called on Israel to halt excavations near Jerusalem’s most sacred Islamic site and to proceed only under international supervision.

The excavations near a religious site holy to both Muslims and Jews set off widespread Muslim protests last month. The report says, though, that the excavations for a pedestrian walkway have been done according to professional standards.

Mark Regev, a spokesman for the Israeli Foreign Ministry, said he had not seen the report but understood that it exonerated Israel from endangering the Muslim holy site.

“The report strongly confirms what we have been saying all along — that what Israel is doing is benign,” he said. If that is the case, he added, “there’s no reason why we can’t continue,” though he left open the possibility of an intensified consultation process.

The Winograd committee does not have the legal standing of a full state commission of inquiry. It will not assess the legal liability of officials under scrutiny or demand their removal. But the committee is widely expected to criticize the performance of the top political and military echelons in the 34-day conflict, and has a similar weight to that of a state commission in the eyes of the public.

“It is an issue of public accountability,” said Shlomo Avineri, a professor of political science at Hebrew University of Jerusalem. “If the language is very strong, the criticism will create a dynamic of its own.”

The interim report is likely to focus on the army’s preparedness for the war, and the government decision-making process that led to it. Questions have also been raised in Israel about whether clear goals were set for the war, and what, if anything, was achieved.

Several days into the war, Mr. Olmert justified the military campaign in Lebanon that followed the July 12 capture of two Israeli soldiers and the killing of three more in a cross-border raid by Hezbollah, the Lebanese Shiite militant group. Hezbollah responded to Israeli retaliation by bombarding northern Israel with rockets. “When missiles are launched at our residents and cities, our answer will be war,” Mr. Olmert told Parliament on July 17.

Israeli news media reported that Mr. Olmert had testified to the Winograd panel that the theoretical decision, after a capture attempt, to respond to any future seizure by Hezbollah with a broad military campaign was made four months before, in March 2006. That account has been challenged by political and military figures who denied knowledge of any early plans. The two captured soldiers have not been returned.

Mr. Olmert leads a solid government coalition with a firm majority in Parliament. But he is already operating under investigations of suspicions of improprieties, and his approval ratings are at a record low for an Israeli prime minister.

The committee’s announcement raised speculation about whether Mr. Olmert’s Kadima Party would unite behind a new leader if he resigned, or split, with some members returning to Likud. The Likud leader, Benjamin Netanyahu, apparently hopes that enough members would defect to allow him to form a new governing coalition in a parliamentary move, without early elections.