Under Merz, more Continuity than Change in German Policy toward the Middle East • Stimson Center– www.stimson.org

Source Link
Excerpt:

European opinion toward Israel appears to be shifting in a more negative direction as the war in Gaza grinds on. But in Germany, where a new government was formed on May 6, foreign policy will likely feature more continuity than breaks with the past.

The new government is led by the center-right Christian Democratic Union and its sister party in Bavaria, the Christian Social Union (CDU/CSU), which together took 29 percent of the vote. Friedrich Merz, a 69-year-old West German with no prior experience in a governing coalition, is the new chancellor.

German political commentators expect Merz’s chancellorship to be strongly oriented towards foreign affairs in a context of uncertainty over the outcome of the Ukraine war and Donald Trump’s tariff policies. In a sign of the importance Merz attaches to foreign policy, he was willing to make concessions to his partner, the center-left Social Democrats (SPD), in the allocation of other ministries in exchange for securing for his party the foreign ministry, which in Germany has traditionally gone to the government’s junior partner.

Merz also plans to create a national security council that would tie Germany’s foreign policy closer to the work of the chancellor. The choice of Johann Wadephul, a personal friend, to head the council is part of this effort to centralize foreign policymaking.