This week, Israel was attacked by missiles from the North (Lebanon), East (Iran), and South (Yemen), but the most lethal missiles are the ideological ones coming from the West (Europe).
Those ideological missiles – also aimed at the United States – demonstrate that we are in the midst of a fast-moving attempt to negate the idea of the Jewish state, and through it the idea of Judaism.
As discussed in my 2024 book, The Assault on Judaism, this existential threat to Israel, and a strategic one for the United States, requires a comprehensive national security strategy.
The physical missiles – also aimed at Israel’s Arab neighbors – demonstrate that Israelis and Arabs are on the same side. Contrary to European perception, the Arab interest is not for a weak Israel, but for a strong and prosperous Jewish state. Indeed, the Iran war showcased that there is a Middle East-wide dependency on the military and economic might of Israel.
Putting those two factors together, we are now witnessing a dramatic paradigm shift towards new Middle East alliances and peace frameworks, such as those outlined in my new book, From Survival to Peace.
This paradigm shift was evident in last week’s peace negotiations between Lebanon and Israel. The talks underscored that the enemy of Lebanon is not Israel, but outside forces that colonized it and exploited the country once known as the “Switzerland of the Middle East”.
Colonization of Lebanon
In the 1970s, it was the Palestinians: The PLO, expelled from Jordan after a string of terrorist attacks, took over southern Lebanon and established a de facto Palestinian state, known as “Fathahland” (a “no-go zone” that some see as a prototype for what could come in Europe).
In the 2000s, it was Iran: They too created “a state within the state,” through its proxy, Hezbollah, providing healthcare, social services, and municipal services for much of southern Lebanon.
Both the PLO and Hezbollah used their occupied Lebanese land as a launchpad for terrorist attacks against Israel, leading Israel to invade the “state within a state,” such as in 1982 and 2026. Both of those invasions led Lebanon and Israel to peace talks.
Palestinians and Iranians were not the first ones to colonize Lebanon.
The French invasion of Lebanon and Syria in 1920 not only plunged the Middle East into a century of war, but also into a century of Western-imposed “peace frameworks” that have nothing to do with the Middle East, such as the idea of using land as currency for peace (“the depth of withdrawal as the depth of peace”), and various other academic “peace through appeasement” formulas.
De-colonization through de-Europeanization
A century after kick-starting the conflict, it seems that Europe is on its way out of the Middle East. This is evident in its noticeable absence from the Iran war, the Lebanon peace talks, and the newly-formed Board of Peace.
This in turn provides an unprecedented opportunity for sustainable peace, based on organic Middle East realities and local interests.
Moreover, de-Europeanization of the Middle East would free Europe to focus its energy and capital on the growing threat to global stability and US national security stemming from Europe itself – an ideological threat acknowledged in the 2025 US national security strategy.
European vs Arabs: Sanctions vs peace
But Europe is resisting: Instead of looking for ways to help and benefit from the new US-Israeli-Arab alliance, anchored in the light emanating from Zion, Europe seems to go out of its way to undermine it.
This week’s Iranian missiles were fired in reaction to Israel bombing Hezbollah targets in Beirut. But Europe’s ideological missiles were unprovoked – they were fired for the sake of firing. Europe targeted Israeli infrastructure in Judea and Samaria, home to scientists, professors and entrepreneurs that advance humanity and save lives – in Europe, the Middle East and around the world.
The EU sanctioned this month organizations involved with land purchase, security for residents, and promotion of the rule of law. Such organizations were labeled by the EU as “extremists.” As my EU friends often reiterate, any form of Jewish life in the West Bank is “extremism” and illegitimate.
In this realm, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot gloated: “The European Union is sanctioning today the main Israeli organizations guilty of supporting the extremist and violent colonization of the West Bank.”
And so, a new divide is emerging:
Arabs wishing to benefit from the light coming from Judea, Samaria, Tel Aviv, Jerusalem and other parts of the Jewish state (peace) vs. Europeans wishing to block this light (sanctions).
This relates to the Lebanon peace talks, led by Israel’s Ambassador to the United States, Michael Leiter. The ambassador is not only a settler living in the West Bank, but is part and parcel of its infrastructure, having served in leadership roles in the Judea and Samaria council.
And so another dichotomy is formed:
For Lebanon, Ambassador Leiter represents its conduit towards peace. For Europe, he represents “extremist and violent colonization of the West Bank”.
Adding one plus one, it seems Europe is on a mad rush to sanction the path to peace.
Indeed, Europe is trying to cling to the twilight of its disruptive intervention in the Middle East.
This as the United States seems to be shifting from a Europe-facing Middle East strategy, based on legacy obligations – such as NATO, the special relationship with the UK, and ancestral bonds – towards an “America First”-facing strategy, based on reciprocal cooperation with its “model ally” Israel, and its Arab partners:
The new US-Israel-Arab alliance.
The writer is the author of the new book From Survival to Peace: Turning the Assault on Judaism around (2026). He is also the author of The Assault on Judaism: The Existential Threat is Coming from the West (2024), and of Judaism 3.0: Judaism’s Transformation to Zionism (2022). He is chairman of the Judaism 3.0 think tank. For his geopolitical analysis, visit EuropeAndJerusalem.com.