{"id":274605,"date":"2025-07-19T11:37:21","date_gmt":"2025-07-19T11:37:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/274605\/"},"modified":"2025-07-19T11:37:21","modified_gmt":"2025-07-19T11:37:21","slug":"germanys-merz-blasts-israeli-offensive-in-gaza-politico","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/274605\/","title":{"rendered":"Germany\u2019s Merz blasts Israeli offensive in Gaza \u2013 POLITICO"},"content":{"rendered":"

But Merz\u2019s comments suggest his government\u2019s position may have shifted amid Israel\u2019s new military offensive<\/a> in the Gaza Strip, with many Gazans at risk of starvation in the aftermath of an 11-week aid blockade, according to humanitarian groups<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cGermany must exercise greater restraint than any other country in the world in giving public advice to Israel,\u201d Merz said. \u201cBut when borders are crossed, when international humanitarian law is really being violated, the German chancellor must also say something about it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Merz suggested he will discuss Israel\u2019s renewed offensive in a scheduled call with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu later this week. \u201cWe have a great interest in remaining at Israel\u2019s side,\u201d Merz added. \u201cBut the Israeli government must not do anything that its best friends are no longer prepared to accept.\u201d<\/p>\n

Merz\u2019s comments come as debate grows in Germany over the government\u2019s military backing for Israel. Some lawmakers from the center-left Social Democratic Party \u2014 Merz\u2019s junior coalition partner \u2014 are calling\u00a0for an end to the country\u2019s weapons exports to Israel<\/a>. \u201cGerman weapons must not be used to spread humanitarian catastrophes and to violate international law,\u201d Adis Ahmetovic, foreign policy spokesperson for the SPD group in the Bundestag, said in an interview with German magazine\u00a0Stern<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The German government\u2019s commissioner for combatting antisemitism, Felix Klein, also sparked a debate in Germany in calling for a \u201cmore honest discussion\u201d of how Germans interpret their Staatsr\u00e4son with regard to Israel.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe must do everything in our power to preserve the security of Israel and Jews worldwide,\u201d Klein said in an interview with Germany\u2019s Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung<\/a> daily paper. \u201cBut we must also be clear that this is no justification for everything. Starving the Palestinians and deliberately making the humanitarian situation dramatically worse has nothing to do with safeguarding Israel\u2019s right to exist. And it cannot be the German reason of state either.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"But Merz\u2019s comments suggest his government\u2019s position may have shifted amid Israel\u2019s new military offensive in the Gaza…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":274606,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5310],"tags":[6505,768,5719,2000,299,1945,1824,837,2597,48,13466],"class_list":{"0":"post-274605","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-germany","8":"tag-benjamin-netanyahu","9":"tag-borders","10":"tag-cities","11":"tag-eu","12":"tag-europe","13":"tag-friedrich-merz","14":"tag-germany","15":"tag-israel","16":"tag-military","17":"tag-rights","18":"tag-terrorism"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/114879702288744751","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274605","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=274605"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/274605\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/274606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=274605"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=274605"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=274605"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}