Europe simmers again amid riots, looting, and burning. Yet many of its leaders still fail to understand how their decisions created this climate. For years, Europe’s leaders appeased the West’s adversaries, looking past aggression and favoring accommodation, both abroad and at home.
They mistook appeasement for peace, and anarchy followed.
In the Middle East, they offered Iran sanctions relief and talks while treating Israel’s self-defense as the region’s central problem. That same aversion to force drove their domestic policy. At home, they focused on social spending programs at the cost of military and law enforcement capabilities. This was done amid mass migration — itself fueled by allowing destabilizing forces in the Middle East and elsewhere to flourish — with poor enforcement and no expectation that individuals integrate. Where security was needed, much of Europe favored unchecked migration, without regard for the burden it placed on strained bureaucracies.
What is unfolding on Europe’s streets is in many respects a predictable consequence of the continent’s approach to transnational threats, particularly in the Middle East. When the United States and Israel took forceful action against terrorists, the reaction was first to criticize the use of military power — a power they enjoyed the protection of while allowing their security apparatuses to decay. When shared threats demanded action, they pressured allies instead.
European diplomats preached restraint, used the United Nations to issue endless calls for diplomacy, and — to make matters worse — enabled the International Criminal Court to target Israeli leadership for the “crime” of fighting Hamas’s butchers. Some nations pledged they would execute warrants against Israeli leadership.
Policy choices regarding the Middle East kept expanding the gap. France banned Israelis from defense expositions, condemned Israel for degrading Hamas, halted sales of offensive arms, and condemned operations against Hezbollah terrorists, never missing an opportunity to frustrate advances in Lebanon’s security. The French were but one of many European nations issuing condemnations of the U.S. and Israel for taking action.
The opening for malign actors to exploit Europe’s diplomatic goodwill grew.
The coup de grâce came when French President Emmanuel Macron recognized a Palestinian state in September 2025, while Hamas remained armed and held hostages. Despite his road map, Macron caved to terrorists before even his conditions were met. Hamas cheered the announcement as a “positive step.”
Radical left-wing and Islamist movements exploited the political cover created by these choices. They framed Hamas’s murderous attack as a result of “Israeli occupation,” then turned around and claimed the Israeli militia’s response a “genocide,” shifting blame off Hamas and giving cover to terrorist grievances. Leaders offering concessions to these elements were inadvertently inviting that same violence to their shores.
No one should be surprised that the red-green alliance is rocking Europe. First, this isn’t a new phenomenon. It was the unexpected pairing of Marxist intellectuals and Shia clerics that drove the Shah out of Iran in 1979, ushering in the Islamic Revolution and the chaos it has sewn across the region since then. The red-green alliance is powerful, in part because its members need no shared vision, just shared enemies — the Western tradition broadly viewed as democratic, capitalistic, and rooted in Judeo-Christian values.
The problem is not exclusive to Europe. We’ve seen echoes of this in the U.S., with protests in the wake of Hamas’s rampage condemning Israel instead of terrorists, illegal encampments at universities, and DSA politicians using the same excuse to tear down America’s institutions.
American left-wing politicians frequently point to Western Europe as a beacon for America, as if achieving America’s promise requires a return to continental norms. James Talarico thinks Western Europe should be “an inspiration” for America, he claims, is backsliding on democracy. Sen. Chris Murphy (D-CT) and Gov. Tim Walz (D-MN) trashed America and cozied up to Pedro Sanchez’s anti-American government in Spain. AOC went to Munich to pile scorn on America before the global elite.
THE FRANCE RIOTS AREN’T A STUDENT REVOLT — THEY’RE SUPPORTED BY CCP-TIED DARK MONEY
When Democrats discuss being more like Western Europe, Americans should be alarmed. They would rather import Europe’s failures than consider how those policies led to the continent’s decline.
The images out of Western Europe are a warning to America of what will become if the far-left is empowered to follow Europe’s soft-on-Iran and harsh-on-Israel approach. Threats abroad demand decisive action, not empty diplomatic assurances or words of appeasement, certainly not condemnation of those brave enough to act. There can be no concessions to those who defend heinous violence and seek to undermine the very foundations of Western civilization.
Cale Brown is a former principal deputy spokesperson of the U.S. State Department and serves as chair of Polaris National Security.