BACK TO CACOPHONY
Nothing screams “great power” like an aircraft-carrier. So in October Thierry Breton, the European commissioner from France, raised the idea of the EU equipping itself with such a seafaring airbase. Alas, even before the merits of a floating jet-launcher for an alliance with neither navy nor air force could be considered, the EU’s geopolitical ambitions appeared as pathetic as a plane lurching off the deck and nose-diving into the ocean. In the days around Mr Breton’s flight of fancy, aninconsistent response to the terrorist attacks in Israel left Europe looking weak. A union that had found its foreign-policy voice over Ukraine has rediscovered its taste for cacophony. Chaotic diplomacy and internal frictions have set back the cause of a “geopolitical EU” to match China and America.
Europe’s first response to the Gaza-Israel crisis was the decision to suspend all development aid to Palestinians—a serious move, considering the bloc is their largest donor. The policy was soon reversed amid rising concerns in national capitals about the living conditions of innocent Gazans. Later in the week, the commission’s boss, Ursula von der Leyen, travelled to Israel. Her message there was dutifully sympathetic. But national capitals fumed that she had failed to emphasise that any response from Israel needs to keep within the boundaries of international law. Government after government briefed that she was speaking not for the EU, merely for herself. As the outrage mounted, Mrs von der Leyen’s team speedily announced that the EU’s humanitarian aid to Gaza was to be tripled.
The war in Ukraine had given the EU a measure of geopolitical clout. The club had found new means to be relevant, for example by paying for arms to be sent to Ukraine. That kind of resolve now looks like a one-off. Attempts at forging a coherent response to the crisis in Gaza have stagnated due to constant disagreement between national capitals and EU institutions. Far from projecting power to the outside world, European politicians have instead looked within: a meeting of 27 national leaders was arranged to get everyone on the same page, which was not Mrs von der Leyen’s. A tense personal relationship between her and Charles Michel, the European Council president, used to be the stuff of the Brussels cocktail circuit. Now it looks as if it made the bloc even more impotent than it might otherwise have been.
The episode is damaging for Mrs von der Leyen, who since the war in Ukraine had been the face of a more forceful, geopolitical Europe. Her influence seemed to extend beyond Ukraine. A speech she gave in March 2022 calling for a more inclusive attitude to China had set a new tone in the relationship there; she has worked closely with America, too. New buzz phrases like “strategic autonomy” and “Team Europe” had hinted at the bloc playing its full part in geopolitics, a third power in a bipolar world. Sadly, Mrs von der Layen has failed to maintain a similar consistency in the face of the Gaza conflict.
In trying to project a similarly forceful EU in the Middle East, the unity that underpinned Europe’s previous efforts was lacking. Some European countries, notably Mrs von der Leyen’s native Germany, side with Israel, emphasising its right to defend itself. But others, such as Spain and Ireland, are more attuned to the suffering of Palestinians, and warn of an impending humanitarian disaster. Many simply felt the dispute was beyond the competenceof EU’s central institutions. Ukraine united European leaders who jointly visited Kyiv after the Russian invasion. This latest crisis divides the bloc. This week the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, travelled to Israel alone. France’s Emmanuel Macron is considering a later trip.
Divided or otherwise, it is unlikely Europe would have had much effect on Israel’s response to being attacked. But its impotence is starting to look serial. The EU painted itself as a mediator in a dispute between Azerbaijan and Armenia, yet could do little but meekly protest when Azerbaijan kicked Armenians out of the Nagorno-Karabakh enclave. A deal with Tunisia to help cut migration across the Mediterranean has come to nothing: Tunisia returned €60m the EU had paid it to seal the agreement. Kosovo and Serbia keep arguing despite appeals from Brussels.
The EU’s fans hoped that its impressive response to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine had exorcised a set of demons which have long haunted it: that it is a construct perfectly adept at standardising phone chargers and making farmers rich, but one that scarcely matters when it comes to high politics. A fortnight of disunion has made the EU look as indecisive as ever: a club that does not create geopolitics so much as endure its effects.