Steinmeier is behind Gabriel

"We should have confidence": Federal President Steinmeier expressed his contempt for the meeting between Prime Minister Netanyahu and Sigmar Gabriel in Israel - and placed himself on the side of the Foreign Minister.

On his visit to Israel, Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier criticized the recent escalation in bilateral relations. "We do not need any new rules," he said in Jerusalem on Sunday. An "honest and open dialogue" is necessary. 

Steinmeier referred to the "turmoil" during the visit of Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel two weeks ago, when Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu canceled a meeting because Gabriel had met government-critical organizations. "We should have confidence that friends we are,

 who are heard here - from whomever it comes," said Steinmeier at a meeting with Israeli President Reuven Rivlin. "The unique relationship between our two countries is too important to measure alone on the question of who are or should be legitimate interlocutors.

" Rivlin only indirectly interfered with the quarrels. Israel is a "very lively democracy", he said: "Some voices are" hard to digest and outrage ". At the same time, Rivlin explicitly concluded Gabriel's visit to his praise of the lively exchange between the two countries and good relations. The Federal President meets Netanyahu personally in the afternoon. In the morning he had visited the Holocaust Memorial Yad Vashem in Jerusalem. "Impossible fault we Germans have loaded with us," 

wrote Steinmeier in the guestbook. It is the arrival of Steinmeier as head of state in Israel, which he had traveled almost a dozen times as a foreign minister. The groups Breaking The Silence and B'Tselem, with which Gabriel had come together, does not want to meet Steinmeier. However, 

he leads talks with writers, intellectuals, opposition politicians and other non-governmental organizations. On Sunday evening, he will also speak at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem on democracy.