Why Israel Got Into a Dust-Up With Germany

Last Monday was Holocaust Memorial Day in Israel. It is a quiet, painful, introspective day, on which even highway traffic comes to a complete halt for two minutes. In his address opening the commemoration, a somewhat belligerent Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu berated Europe for not doing enough to stem anti-Semitism. Then the next day, in an apparent breach of diplomatic protocol, Netanyahu snubbed Germany’s foreign minister, Sigmar Gabriel, by canceling a scheduled meeting. What for? The German envoy had ignored Netanyahu’s demand that he cancel a meeting with Break the Silence, a group deeply critical of the Israeli army’s conduct in Palestinian territories.

Many people wondered why the prime minster chose to pick this fight with Germany. To be sure, his cabinet supported his decision, and he knew that he would earn points with his right flank, on which the future of his government depends. Breaking the Silence, an Israeli grass-roots organization, collects testimonies from soldiers about their military service, mostly in the territories, focusing particularly on alleged abuses by soldiers. The group is seen by many as irresponsible and treasonous. Many of the testimonies it publishes are uncorroborated; some critics say they are false. And because most of Breaking the Silence’s work is done outside Israel, they are seen as trying to sully the Israel Defense Forces in international settings, contributing to the possibility that Israeli soldiers could eventually be charged in the International Court of Justice. Particularly galling to Netanyahu is that most of the group’s funding comes from Europe, which he considers fundamentally hostile to Israel.