Not all of us have woken up to the idea, but suddenly there is very little that connects both continents. Visa rules , travel restrictions, collapse of NATO … USA isolationism and parallel support for Putin are doing the rest, in a couple of years the two continents may be at war.
The USA never really had allies after WWII. They did a lot to stop Germany from taking over the continent, but after that the USA was basically a playground bully, an enforcer, that believes it’s the boss and as long as everyone does what they want, they can be friends.
Now that they start doing things that don’t align with what the ideals of the European Union or Europe in general, suddenly we start seeing that ‘allies’ is a very relative term.
The USA just wants to be number 1. Now that they have started destroying their own economy, suddenly the EU, Canada, China, all of them seem like threats.
Basically the USA is just a market to Europe, and they provide the media we watch in the shape of TV shows and the like. They provide the arms we need to ‘keep peace’ where necessary. If shit is going to hit the fan (more than it did in Ukraine, maybe also tensions in Gaza since Europe doesn’t blindly support Israel), it’s not a given that the USA and Europe will be on the same side, but my point is it was never really a given.
The US was isolationist during much of world war 2 and had a “cash and carry” approach towards selling arms to US allies during the initial part of the war. After much deliberation this became a laxer lend-lease arrangement that had been against the desires of the American people, who did not want to be a creditor in a conflict that had its center stage in Europe and were worried the Brits wouldn’t be able to pay back. These financial arrangements made the US incredibly wealthy, essentially extracting centuries of colonial and slavery based loot from the Brits, which allowed it to become the global hegimon it is today (for now) and brought an end to the British Empire. It took the Brits sixty years to settle the loan.
“To be an enemy of America can be dangerous, but to be a friend is fatal”
While the US came out as clear winners, many postcolonial nations are grateful that the war absolutely decimated the British Empire financially. Every seven days, a nation celebrates its independence from the British Empire. Though it was their inability to continue administrative operations in the colonies (due to financial decimation) that led to some very questionably drawn borders that have played a role in many present day conflicts.
What do you mean “europe doesn’t blindly support israel”? The rise of the far right in all of Europe is very much pro-israel and anti-hamas. There are daily protests for palestine and gavernments are actively ignoring any and all warcrimes that are being commited there.
Do you maybe mean that there is room for discussion? because that may be true. Europe is not a democratic dictatorship like the US. There are different factions in power and some of those are open for discussion.
Yes, there’s room for discussion, so there’s no blind support for Israel. I’m not saying there is no support for Israel. Western Europe is walking the line between appeasement politics and reality. They all know that condemning Israel would create tensions with the US.
But if you look at citizens, pro-Palestine (so not necessarily pro-Hamas) protests are centered around ending human suffering, without actually taking a side in who has a claim to the land there.
The Netherlands is not participating in the Eurovision Song Festival, which might seem like inconsequential, but it’s a pretty big statement. Winners of the contest are returning the awards now that Israel is not banned from participating.
Plus the ICJ is located in the Hague, which isn’t recognized by the USA, but also show some moderate doubts towards what Israel is doing.
The entire situation in Israel is complicated with its roots going far beyond the temporal conscience of people. There’s no clear answer other than that nothing warrants bombing hospitals and blocking humanitarian aid.
I am reminded of the line from Tom Waits’ great song Road To Peace:
They provide the weapons so we can help them with imperialism. Also while Europe doesn’t (?) blindly support Israel, the second biggest genocide enabler comes from EU and third (probably) comes from ex-EU. Yes, there are some European countries that don’t blindly support Israel, but at the best they whine a bit about our concern.