Since taking office seven months ago, center-right Christian Democrat (CDU) Chancellor Friedrich Merz has been engaged with the German-Israeli “special relationship.” There have been several disputes between Berlin and Jerusalem over Israel’s actions in the Gaza Strip in response to the Hamas-led terrorist attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, which claimed more than 1,200 lives. According to the Gaza health ministry, which the UN and many rights organizations have deemed as reliable, at least 70,000 Palestinians have been killed amid Israel’s military conduct since October 2023. Numerous international rights organizations and a UN commission of inquiry have found Israel’s war in Gaza to be a genocide.Merz’s inaugural visit to Jerusalem is therefore a difficult mission. Some things speak for continuity, others for change. This is already clear from the statements made by the Israeli ambassador to Germany, Ron Prosor, in response to comments made by the chancellor.When Merz, just two weeks into office, expressed concern at Israel’s actions in Gaza at the end of May and spoke of a breach of international humanitarian law, Prosor remained calm: “When Friedrich Merz voices this criticism of Israel, we listen very carefully because he is a friend,” the diplomat told German public broadcaster ZDF.Eleven weeks later, the tone was quite different: at the beginning of August, in view of the humanitarian situation in the Gaza Strip, Merz decided to stop supplying certain military equipment to Israel “until further notice.” Specifically, this concerned weapons that could also be used in the war in the Gaza Strip. According to the chancellor, the German government could not supply weapons to a conflict that could cause “hundreds of thousands of civilian casualties.“Prosor’s criticism of the decision was unusually sharp. The move by the chancellor did not bring about the release of Israeli hostages from Hamas or a ceasefire, he told Germany’s Die Welt news channel. What was being discussed was “the disarmament of Israel,” according to Prosor, who also said it was “a celebration for Hamas.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also spoke of Merz rewarding Hamas.It was not until mid-November that the German government lifted the restrictions on arms exports with effect from November 24. Government spokesman Stefan Kornelius cited the ceasefire in the Gaza Strip that came into force on October 10 as the reason for this.But the ceasefire has been anything but stable, with occasional skirmishes between Hamas fighters and Israeli soldiers, as well as rocket attacks from the Israel forces on Gaza. The territory’s health ministry reports that more than 300 people have been killed by Israeli shelling across the Gaza Strip since the ceasefire began, including many children.Regular calls between Merz and NetanyahuOn Sunday, Merz will be Netanyahu’s guest again. More often than his predecessors, the chancellor mentions long phone calls with the Israeli prime minister in his statements, whether on the overall situation in the Middle East, the humanitarian crisis in Gaza, or the 12-day war between Israel and Iran.These came amid questions of whether Germany would uphold its international obligations, as a party to the International Criminal Court statutes, to arrest Netanyahu — who has been under an ICC arrest warrant since November 2024 for crimes against humanity and war crimes — should he visit Germany, as it would be required to do according to international law. Merz said in February 2025 shortly before taking office that “I have also promised him that we will find ways and means for him to visit Germany and also to be able to leave again without being arrested in Germany.“In addition to political talks with Netanyahu and Israeli President Isaac Herzog, the German chancellor’s visit to the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial will certainly be significant. The site keeps alive the memory of the 6 million Jews murdered by Nazi Germany in the Holocaust. Israel also took note of how Merz appeared to fight back tears in mid-September during a speech at the reopening of a synagogue in Munich that was destroyed by the Nazis 87 years ago. He also expressed his “shame” at the resurgence of antisemitism in Germany.Merz admits difficulty with ‘reason of state’After the dispute over arms exports, Merz asserted that the German-Israeli “friendship” could withstand disagreement on a specific issue: “Nothing has changed in that regard, and nothing will change,” Merz said.The German chancellor, on the other hand, admits to having difficulty with the concept of “reason of state,” as it has “never been spelled out in all its consequences,” as he said in a newspaper interview in October. This term was used by Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU) in 2008, when she became the first foreign head of government ever to address the Knesset, the Israeli parliament. “Every federal government and every chancellor before me has been committed to Germany’s special historical responsibility for the security of Israel. This historical responsibility of Germany is part of my country’s reason of state,” Merkel said.Merz also used the term in June, but hardly ever since. At an event in the fall, Merz spoke immediately after Josef Schuster, president of the Central Council of Jews in Germany. Schuster used the term “reason of state” several times, but Merz did not use it once. Instead, the chancellor said that Germany’s commitment to the existence and security of the State of Israel “is a non-negotiable part of the normative foundations of our country.“Merz is now travelling to Jerusalem, a good seven months after his election. His two predecessors, Olaf Scholz and Angela Merkel, made their inaugural visits to the Israeli head of government within the first three months of taking office. Neither of them made any further stops on their trips. Merz, on the other hand, is first flying to Jordan to meet with the Jordanian king in Amman before continuing on to Israel.
