SAEDNEWS: Tehran has condemned German Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s assertion that Israel’s recent strikes on Iranian nuclear sites were legal, likening his remarks to a revival of Nazi-era doctrines.
According to Saed News, Iran’s political establishment reacted with indignation after Chancellor Friedrich Merz publicly declared Israel’s June assaults on Fordow, Natanz and Isfahan nuclear facilities “legitimate under international law.” Speaking in the Bundestag on July 13, Merz stated that he had been informed in advance by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and described the operations as a “pre-emptive strike against a potentially imminent nuclear threat.”
Legal scholars have pointed out that the 1977 Additional Protocol to the Vienna Convention prohibits assaults on nuclear installations, while environmental experts warn of catastrophic civilian and ecological fallout. In a scathing response carried by Fars News Agency, Deputy Foreign Minister Seyed Abbas Araghchi accused Merz of “slaughtering” Germany’s post‑war reputation and resurrecting “the spirit of Nazi Germany.” He challenged the chancellor: “What exactly are you firing at? And if there is no threat, what dossier does Mossad hold in the heart of the White House?”
Araghchi further invoked Israel’s earlier embassy bombing in Damascus and recent U.S.–Israeli airstrikes on Iranian soil, which Tehran says claimed over 1,000 lives, calling Merz’s position “reckless” and “complicit.” He contrasted the chancellor’s stance with that of former German Chancellor Gerhard Schröder, who opposed the 2003 Iraq invasion on similar legal grounds.
Merz’s remarks depart from the more cautious responses of other European leaders—Paris and London have neither formally condemned nor endorsed the strikes—and risk straining Berlin’s relations with Tehran at a time when negotiations over Iran’s nuclear programme are at a critical juncture. Observers in both capitals now await whether German parliamentarians will demand an explanation or pursue censure of the chancellor for his controversial endorsement.
