Number of Israelis Acquiring German Citizenship Nearly Doubles Since 2021

The number of Israeli citizens naturalised in Germany rose from 2,485 in 2021 to 4,275 in 2024, according to Germany's Interior Ministry. In Berlin alone, 202 Israeli citizens received German citizenship in 2024, around three times higher than just a few years earlier, Bild reported.

Euronews reported that the Hamas-led attacks on Israel on 7 October 2023 and subsequent developments in the Middle East contributed to a further rise in German citizenship applications.

Eliyahu Raful moved to Berlin in October 2020 from his birthplace in Bnei Brak. " Descendants of victims of Nazi persecution are not required to provide a language certificate. Raful moved his application to Dresden, after which it progressed, and he received his German passport in August 2023.

Raful founded Chafetz Chayim, an organisation that helps descendants of Jewish victims of Nazi persecution navigate the German citizenship application process. Demand for Chafetz Chayim's support has risen steadily in recent years. Before 7 October 2023, the group's clients were mainly secular, internationally mobile Israelis.

After the attacks, Chafetz Chayim received clients from Mea Shearim, the ultra-Orthodox neighbourhood in Jerusalem. Article 116(2) of Germany's Basic Law entitles people stripped of German citizenship between 1933 and 1945 and their descendants to have it restored.

Section 15 of the Nationality Act, which has applied since 2021, covers people who never held German citizenship because they were prevented from acquiring it as victims of Nazi persecution.

Claims under Section 15 are neither time-limited nor restricted to specific generations, according to Germany's Federal Office of Administration. In 2024, 2,185 cases were processed under Section 15, the Interior Ministry said. As of 1 April 2026, 17,689 applications under Article 116 Paragraph 2 of the Basic Law were still pending at the Federal Office of Administration.

The number of citizenship restoration applications at the German Consulate General in New York rose from 734 in 2022 to 1,771 in 2025, according to Tagesschau. S. citizens have no longer needed permission to retain their American citizenship when naturalising in Germany.

Eliyahu Raful said his clientele changed after the Hamas-led attacks of 7 October 2023. He observed a generational shift in which younger applicants viewed Germany through the lens of future security rather than immediate Holocaust memory. Felix Klein, the Federal Government Commissioner for Jewish Life and the Fight against Antisemitism, addressed the trend directly.

"I consider it an enormous vote of confidence that Jews from Israel and the USA can imagine a life and a future in Germany, the former country of the perpetrators," Klein said. Raful rejected framing the applications in terms of forgiveness. "I wouldn't describe the symbolic meaning in terms of forgiveness.

In my view, it's more about trust: trust that today's Germany has learnt something essential from its history and that its legal and democratic system can offer security and a future," he stated. Nazi Germany's armed forces surrendered unconditionally on 8 May 1945.

On the anniversary of that date in 2026, the rising naturalisation figures reflect both legal pathways created after the war and contemporary pressures felt by Jewish communities abroad.

Raful noted that for many applicants, citizenship represents a practical contingency rather than an immediate plan to relocate.