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| Olmert praises Germany in Lebanon crisis
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Israeli Prime minister Ehud Olmert (L) with German Chancellor Angela Merkel
Photo: AFP Copyright 2006
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BERLIN (EJP)--- Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert has praised German Chancellor Angela Merkel for being a “helpful friend” during the Lebanon crisis.
Merkel has repeatedly backed Olmert’s demand that his country’s kidnapped soldiers first be returned, unharmed, and that the Hezbollah and Hamas rocket attacks against Israel stop, before a cease-fire need be negotiated.
“So far, there has been no country as supportive of Israel than Germany,” Olmert said in an interview with the Sueddeutsche Zeitung (SZ) newspaper
In response to Germany’s good will, he showed his interest in having German troops stationed along his country’s border to Lebanon – despite reservations aired by Holocaust survivors residing in Israel as well as the Central Council of Jews in Germany.
“I would be happy if Germany would be a contributor in a UN peacekeeping force, should it come into existence,” Olmert told the paper.
Controversial topic
Since the conflict began, Merkel’s Christian Democrats have been trying to keep the subject of German participation in a peacekeeping mission off the cabinet’s agenda. Merkel recently called such talk “premature”.
The ruling coalition partner, the Social Democrats (SPD) has, however, been able to push the topic onto Merkel’s agenda. Several prominent Social Democratic ministers, including Frank-Walter Steinmeier, the foreign minister, have backed the French president’s call for an immediate cease-fire – to Merkel’s displeasure.
Nevertheless, the German chancellor has been able to minimise talk about it. She and Steinmeier found consensus. They publicly agreed that Germany would not categorically refuse to join a peacekeeping mission – but that they would be willing to take up the opportunity when the time comes.
Walter Kolbow, deputy head of the SPD parliamentary group told Deutschland Radio that Olmert has merely given Germany the go ahead to discuss the topic in more detail.
Suddenly, Kolbow is finding resistance from within his own party. Now that Olmert’s thoughts have been made public, some voices in Social Democratic circles are beginning to side themselves with Merkel – agreeing that Germany’s military capacity has already been spread too thinly in its current peacekeeping commitments in Afghanistan, the Balkans and Congo.
Commitment increase
Johannes Kahrs, speaker of the Social Democrats’ right wing Seeheimer Circle told the Netzzeitung press agency that increasing the number of German commitments abroad would be “very difficult”.
The Christian Democratic defence committee speaker told Netzzeitung that Germany can only “commit itself to tasks which it can shoulder”. “Soldiers that are not adequately supplied are no good to anyone,” he said.
He praised Steinmeier’s attempts to bring Syria to the negotiating table. Without the support of Syria and also Iran, Hezbollah would not necessarily agree to the stationing of foreign troops on Lebanese soil, he commented.
The head of the far left Party of the Left, Oskar Lafontaine, fears that Olmert’s praise of Germany will get its soldiers into trouble, if stationed in Lebanon. He fears that Arabs would now consider Germany too much on the side of Israel.
Daily contact
Tony Snow, US President George Bush’s spokesman, told the SZ that Merkel has been in daily contact with Olmert and the American president.
Together they have been searching for a way to formulate a UN-Security Council resolution that would send a clear message to all aggressor parties –but also mildly seek a tempering of Israeli firepower against Lebanon.
Snow said that Merkel has been trying to mediate between Bush and French president Chirac. Both have openly been disagreeing on which approach to take. Chirac has been seeking an unconditional cease-fire, while Bush agrees with Olmert’s demands.
Having successfully re-established an excellent rapport with the US Government, a relationship that went sour during the leadership of former chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, Merkel is using her good relationship to France to intercede between the two nuclear powers.
Because it is the first time that an Israeli leader has called Germany a stabilising factor in Middle East politics, Israel’s ambassador to Germany, Shimon Stein, in a N24 television interview, called Olmert’s unstinting praise for Germany “a Novum” as well as “a new precedence”.
To-date, Germany has sent 4.1 million euros in aid to Lebanon. Also, 235 people have so far asked for asylum in the Federal Republic.
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