Merz and Israel: The Chancellor writes history – rightly

Friedrich Merz had a long way to go in a short time. As a candidate for Chancellor, he assured Benjamin Netanyahu his unrestricted solidarity with his warfare in Gaza. “We support the Israeli government in its fight against terror,” said the CDU leader when he visited Jerusalem in February 2024. No but nothing.

The day after the Bundestag election, Merz promised Netanyahu on the phone that he would receive it regardless of an international arrest warrant in Germany. Last Wednesday, Merz in the cabinet scolded so on Israel’s responsibility for the humanitarian situation in the Gaza strip for the first time that it also penetrated the outside due to the closed doors. And this Monday Merz wrote German-Israeli history.

Never before has a Chancellor publicly condemned Israel to the leadership of a war on self -defense as Merz at the WDR’s European goal. After attacks on Israel, campaigns against the Hisbollah, like Hamas, also fell in the terms of office of Angela Merkel and Olaf Scholz with many civilian victims among the Palestinians. Merkel and Scholz always warned Israel to protect the proportionality – but refused to determine whether this was done.

Friedrich Merz has now dared to do so. And he went very far. Not only did he deny that the suffering of the civilian population can still be justified by the war against terror. At least with a view to individual actions, he spoke publicly of a violation of humanitarian international law. This is a turning point in German-Israeli relationship. But is it right too?

The Israeli army wages this war because on October 7, 2023, Hamas attacked and slaughtered hundreds of people barbarically, injured more than 5000 people and delayed more than 250 hostages. Many Palestinian civilians die from Israeli rockets, but only because Hamas abuses them as human protective shields because the pictures of death, grief, need and misery should mobilize the world public against Israel. Hamas could quickly end this war if they free the remaining 58 hostages, of which only about 20 are alive, from their violence.

The suffering of the Palestinians, which can be seen every day in the television pictures, faces the suffering of the hostages, which are invisibly pregnant in any tunnels, may be abused; The suffering of the Palestinians stand against the fear and the sleepless nights of the relatives, opposite the at least 400 Israeli soldiers who have fallen in Gaza.

Israel has a good reason to wage this war against terror. And Friedrich Merz has to put up with the accusation that at least with his language and the form of his criticism he does not really do justice to the complexity of the conflict or the scope of his statements.

So he reported on talks with Netanyahu, in which he already wanted to have warned: “Don’t exaggerate it.” Don’t exaggerate? So succinctly, indirectly down from above, one should not speak directly or indirectly about a war and its difficult considerations, especially not as Chancellor with an Israeli head of government. And you can also ask whether a panel appearance with some of the intentions, but not very precise sentences from the rigid, the reasonable place and the appropriate form are for such a fundamental change of course in the German-Israeli relationship.

In addition, the question must be allowed who Merz is actually aimed at: does his criticism primarily apply to the Israeli government? Or does the Chancellor only join the alleged mood in Germany, the country that has murdered six million Jews and has yet been allowed to live in peace and for 60 years in diplomatic relationships with Israel? Is Merz Netanyahu criticizing only because his own citizens who have no idea about Israeli life in a constant threat, fear of existence and war trauma, from the suffering of the Palestinians in their German idyll anymore?

You can see that we shouldn’t make it too easy with this conflict. And the Chancellor certainly not. Nevertheless, it remains to be seen in the end: Merz is right with his criticism. Precisely because Israel claims self -defense rights, it is also an obligation to comply with other international conventions. Precisely because terrorists were looking for Israel with such a brutal raid, the democratic Israel should show what respect for law means.

The war itself is justified, but Merz has raised the crucial question: where should it actually lead? The attempt to free the last hostages is legitimate. The attempt to smash Hamas is legitimate. But the blockage of the auxiliary deliveries and the announced displacement of the civilian population are obviously no longer in accordance with international law. And if the meaning of the war is no longer justifiable, then it is not its means either. Then the proportionality is no longer preserved.

What follows? Donald Trump shows little interest in the conflict in Gaza, as always when something doesn’t go as easily as he wants. Most European countries have now demonstratively turned away from Israel. Germany will never be possible if it takes its historical responsibility seriously. There is the sentence that you stand by Israel, but the Israeli government can still criticize. Merz exhausted the second part like none of his predecessors.

Now he has to define the first part.