Next to the United States, Germany is Israel's closest ally. But relations have become strained as of late due to Netanyahu's hard right-wing line and the humanitarian crisis in Gaza. Angela Merkel has been far more outspoken than the US president in condemning the IDF's deadly assault on the flotilla last month and has forcefully criticized – in Netanyahu's presence – the building of new settlements in the West Bank.
But things have really come to a head this weekend when a German cabinet minister was refused entry into Gaza:
Germany on Sunday slammed Israel for preventing Development Minister
Dirk Niebel from entering the Gaza Strip to meet with Palestinian
refugees during his current visit to the region."Refusing a
German development minister entry to the Gaza Strip is a great foreign
policy mistake on the part of the Israeli government," Niebel told the
online edition of the Leipziger Volkszeitung newspaper."I am saddened that Israel is making it so difficult for its truest friend to understand its actions."
Niebel
wanted to visit the Hamas-run Palestinian territory Sunday to meet
representatives of the United Nations Relief and Works Agency for
Palestine refugees.'
In the LVZ online piece, Niebel made some comments which may have crossed the line as being undiplomatic, but certainly reflected his feelings of anger and frustration:
„Es ist für Israel fünf Minuten vor Zwölf“, sagte Niebel. Israel sollte
jetzt jede Chance nutzen, „um die Uhr noch anzuhalten.“ […] „Wenn die israelische Regierung Unterstützung für ihre neue
Gaza-Strategie erwartet, dann muss sie zunächst selbst für mehr
Transparenz und für eine neue Partnerschaft sorgen“, verlangte Niebel.
Die Blockade sei „kein Zeichen von Stärke sondern eher ein Beleg
unausgesprochener Angst“.("For Israel, it is five minutes to 12," he said, adding that the
country must take the opportunity "to stop the clock while it can.""If
the Israeli government wants support for its new Gaza strategy then it
must ensure more transparency and a new partnership," he said. The
blockade "is not a sign of strength but rather evidence of unspoken
fear.")
It will be hard for the right-wing press in Israel to paint Niebel as an anti-Semitic Israel-hater or some kind of Nazi. As Der Spiegel points out:
Als Vizepräsident der Deutsch-Israelischen Gesellschaft (DIG) ist er
ein ausgewiesener Freund Israels. In seiner Jugend arbeitete er in
einem Kibbuz. In den Leitsätzen der DIG heißt es, sie sei "die zentrale
Organisation in der Bundesrepublik Deutschland, in der sich Freunde
Israels in überparteilicher Zusammenarbeit zusammenfinden, um in
Solidarität mit dem Staat Israel und seiner Bevölkerung zu wirken".(As vice president of the German-Israeli Society (DIG) he is a stalwart friend of Israel. In his youth he worked on a kibbutz. The charter of the BIS states that it is "the main organization in the German Federal Republic where friends of Israel can come together to work in solidarity with the state of Israel and its people.")
This latest incident will have an impact on Germany's relationship with Israel and is yet one more sign that Germany's foreign policy will no longer be lock-step with the US.
