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☆ Just How Dangerous Is Europe’s Rising Far Right?
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-05 | by ( Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Jordan Bardella, 28, is the new face of the far right in France. Mr. Bardella, the son of Italian immigrants and a college dropout who joined the National Front party (now National Rally) at 16, is the protégé of Marine Le Pen, the perennial hard-right French presidential candidate. Moderate in tone if not content, he is also the personification of the normalization — or banalization — of a party once seen as a quasi-fascist threat to the Republic. Across Europe, the far right is becoming the right, absent any compelling message from traditional conservative parties. Not only have the parties of an anti-immigrant right surged, they have seen the barriers that once kept them out crumble as they are absorbed into the arc of Western democracies.

Persons: Jordan Bardella, Victor Hugo, “ Jordan, Jordan, —, Bardella Organizations: National Front Locations: France, Paris, Montbéliard, Republic, Europe

☆ Xi Visits Europe, Seeking Strategic Opportunity
▼ + stars: | 2024-05-05 | by ( Roger Cohen | Chris Buckley | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

On his first visit to Europe in five years, the Chinese president, Xi Jinping, appears intent on seizing opportunities to loosen the continent’s bonds with the United States and forge a world freed of American dominance. The Chinese leader has chosen three countries to visit — France, Serbia and Hungary — that each, to a greater or lesser degree, look askance at America’s postwar ordering of the world, see China as a necessary counterweight and are eager to bolster economic ties. At a time of tensions with much of Europe — over China’s “no limits” embrace of Russia despite the war in Ukraine, its surveillance state and its apparent espionage activities that led to the recent arrest in Germany of four people — Mr. Xi, who is arriving in France on Sunday, wants to demonstrate China’s growing influence on the continent and pursue a pragmatic rapprochement. For Europe, the visit will test its delicate balancing act between China and the United States, and will no doubt be seen in Washington as a none-too-subtle effort by Mr. Xi to divide Western allies.

Persons: Xi Jinping, Mr, Xi Organizations: — Locations: Europe, United States, — France, Serbia, Hungary, China, Russia, Ukraine, Germany, France, Washington

☆ Macron, Battling the Far Right at Home, Pushes for a Stronger Europe
▼ + stars: | 2024-04-25 | by ( Roger Cohen | Aurelien Breeden | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The nearly two-hour speech reflected Mr. Macron’s conviction that only a reinforced and “sovereign” European Union — a “Europe power,” as he puts it — can save the continent from strategic irrelevancy in an unstable world that is dominated by the United States and China and confronting wars in Europe and the Middle East. “We must be lucid about the fact that our Europe is mortal,” Mr. Macron declared before an audience of government ministers, European ambassadors and other dignitaries. “It can die. It can die and whether it does depends entirely on our choices.”The speech, at the Sorbonne University in Paris, was a follow-up to one that Mr. Macron gave in the same location in September 2017. Then, Mr. Macron discussed the future of Europe and the European Union as a young, recently elected and disruptive president still enjoying a political honeymoon.

Persons: Emmanuel Macron, Mr, Macron Organizations: ”, Sorbonne University, European Union Locations: France, Europe, Ukraine, United States, China, Paris

☆ Angry Farmers Are Reshaping Europe
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-31 | by ( Roger Cohen | Ivor Prickett | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

It was recognized in 1957 with a designation of origin, similar to that accorded a great Bordeaux. “The mash adds a little fat and softens the muscles formed in the fields to make the flesh moist and tender,” Mr. Sibelle explained with evident satisfaction. But if this farmer seemed passionate about his chickens, he is also drained by harsh realities. Mr. Sibelle, 59, is done. He and his wife, Maria, are about to sell a farm that has been in the family for over a century.

Persons: Jean, Michel Sibelle, Mr, Sibelle, Maria Organizations: European Union Locations: France, Bresse, Bordeaux

☆ A French-Malian Singer Is Caught in an Olympic Storm
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-26 | by ( Roger Cohen | Aurelien Breeden | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

In four months, France will host the Paris Olympics, but which France will show up? Torn between tradition and modernity, the country is in the midst of an identity crisis. Right-wing critics say Ms. Nakamura’s music does not represent France, and the prospect of her performing has led to a barrage of racist insults online against her. The outcry has compounded a fight over an official poster unveiled this month: a pastel rendering of the city’s landmarks thronging with people in a busy style reminiscent of the “Where’s Waldo?” children’s books. An opinion essay in the right-wing Journal du Dimanche said “the malaise of a nation in the throes of deconstruction” was in full view.

Persons: Aya Nakamura, Waldo, ”, Napoleon, Dimanche Organizations: Paris Olympics, French Locations: France, Malian, Paris, Invalides

☆ Macron and Scholz Meet, Looking to Patch Up Differences on Ukraine
▼ + stars: | 2024-03-15 | by ( Erika Solomon | Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Chancellor Olaf Scholz and President Emmanuel Macron of France met in Berlin on Friday looking to smooth over their differences on how to support Ukraine in its war with Russia and allay concerns that the Franco-German “engine of Europe” is sputtering. Mr. Scholz hosted Mr. Macron alongside Poland’s prime minister, Donald Tusk, as Europe struggles to maintain unity at a critical moment, with U.S. support for Kyiv in question and Russian forces having made gains on the battlefield. In recent weeks, the differences between the allies have become unusually public and bitter, even as all agree that support for Ukraine is crucial to preventing further Russian aggression in Europe. Mr. Macron, eager to stake out a tougher stance toward President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, chided allies not to be “cowards” after they strongly rebuffed his suggestion that NATO countries should not rule out putting troops in Ukraine. From being Europe’s dove on Russia, the French leader, feeling humiliated over his initial outreach to Mr. Putin, has been transformed over the past two years into its hawk.

Persons: Olaf Scholz, Emmanuel Macron, Scholz, Macron, Donald Tusk, Vladimir V, Putin, ” Organizations: Franco, U.S, Kyiv Locations: France, Berlin, Ukraine, Russia, German, Europe

It was a private dinner in a Parisian garden on the Boulevard St. Germain, meant to cement the important personal relationship between the leaders of France and Germany. Barely disguised insults between them in recent days have pointed to deeper differences over Ukraine, how to confront and contain an aggressive Russia and how to manage an increasingly polarized United States. This week, while visiting Prague, Mr. Macron repeated his refusal to rule out Western troops in Ukraine, a suggestion that surprised his allies who want to avoid a direct confrontation with Russia. Germany, especially, pushed back. Mr. Macron replied in kind.

Persons: Germain, Olaf Scholz, “, Emmanuel Macron muttered, Macron Locations: France, Germany, Ukraine, Russia, United States, Prague

☆ Seeking to Unsettle Russia, Macron Provokes Allies
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-28 | by ( Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

With his jolting unexpected statement that sending Western troops to Ukraine “should not be ruled out,” President Emmanuel Macron of France has shattered a taboo, ignited debate, spread dismay among allies and forced a reckoning on Europe’s future. For an embattled leader who loathes lazy thinking, longs for a Europe of military strength and loves the limelight, this was typical enough. It was Mr. Macron, after all, who in 2019 described NATO as suffering from “brain death” and who last year warned Europe against becoming America’s strategic “vassal.”But bold pronouncements are one thing and patiently putting the pieces in place to attain those objectives, another. Mr. Macron has often favored provocation over preparation, even if he often has a point, as in arguing since 2017 that Europe needed to bolster its defense industry to attain greater strategic heft. By lurching forward without building consensus among allies, Mr. Macron may have done more to illustrate Western divisions and the limits of how far NATO allies are willing to go in defense of Ukraine than achieve the “strategic ambiguity” he says is needed to keep President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia guessing.

Persons: Ukraine “, Emmanuel Macron, Macron, Vladimir V, Putin Organizations: NATO Locations: Ukraine, France, Europe, Russia

☆ Can Gabriel Attal Win Over France?
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-23 | by ( Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Gabriel Attal, 34, is a new kind of French prime minister, more inclined to Diet Coke than a good Burgundy, at home with social media and revelations about his personal life, a natural communicator who reels off one liners like “France rhymes with power” to assert his “authority,” a favorite word. Since taking office in early January, the boyish-looking Mr. Attal has waded into the countryside, far from his familiar haunts in the chic quarters of Paris, muddied his dress shoes, propped his notes on a choreographed bale of hay, and calmed protesting farmers through adroit negotiation leavened by multiple concessions. He has told rail workers threatening a strike that “working is a duty,” not an everyday French admonition. He has shown off his new dog on Instagram and explained that he called the high-energy Chow Chow “Volta” after the inventor of the electric battery. He has told the National Assembly that he is the living proof of a changing France as “a prime minister who assumes his homosexuality.”

Persons: Gabriel Attal, Coke, ”, Attal, muddied, Chow Chow Organizations: National Assembly Locations: Burgundy, France, Paris

☆ Sarkozy’s Prison Sentence Halved to 6 Months
▼ + stars: | 2024-02-14 | by ( Roger Cohen | More About Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

A Paris appeals court upheld on Wednesday the 2021 conviction of former President Nicolas Sarkozy for illegal financing an election campaign but cut his sentence from one year to six months with a further six months suspended. Mr. Sarkozy’s lawyer, Vincent Desry, immediately said that Mr. Sarkozy would appeal to France’s highest court. Nicolas Sarkozy is fully innocent,” he said. “He has taken note of this decision and decided to appeal to the Court of Cassation.”The appeal could take years to be resolved, ensuring that Mr. Sarkozy remains free for the foreseeable future. The former president, known for his irrepressible energy and blunt style, hurried out of court and did not take questions.

Persons: Nicolas Sarkozy, Sarkozy’s, Vincent Desry, Mr, Sarkozy, “ Mr, ”, “ Organizations: Cassation Locations: Paris, France

☆ ‘We Are Not Very Far From an Explosion’
▼ + stars: | 2024-01-31 | by ( Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

Sergey Ponomarev for The New York TimesAs the world focuses on the war in Gaza, pressure is mounting on the West Bank. Israelis and Palestinians live worlds apart, separated often by a single road — or roadblocks. They are united only by a sense of growing anger and resentment.

Persons: Sergey Ponomarev Organizations: The New York Times, West Bank Locations: Gaza

☆ Between Israelis and Palestinians, a Lethal Psychological Chasm Grows
▼ + stars: | 2023-11-20 | by ( Roger Cohen | More About Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

But in general the decades since the collapse of the Oslo Accords in 1993 have accentuated the psychological gulf. Day-to-day interaction between Israelis and Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza has been drastically reduced by walls and fences in a push for physical separation. In the intervening decades, Hamas and the ultranationalist religious Israeli right have each extended their influence. “On the Palestinian side, the ideal solution has become that Israel disappear,” Professor Shany said. “On the Israeli side, there is a desire for Gaza to go away, even if that means bombing it away.

Persons: Yitzhak Rabin’s, “, God, Jordan, Peace, ”, Yuval Shany, Mahmoud al, Shany Organizations: Oslo Accords, West Bank, Hebrew University of Jerusalem Locations: Oslo, Gaza, Palestine, France, Germany, Alsace, Lorraine, Ireland, Israel, “ Israel, Ethiopia, Poland, America

☆ For Europe’s Jews, a World of Fear
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-31 | by ( Roger Cohen | More About Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Perhaps not since the Holocaust, which saw the annihilation of about two-thirds of Europe’s Jewish community, have the Jews of Europe lived in an atmosphere of fear so acute that it feels like a fundamental shift in the terms of their existence. Across a Europe of daubed Stars of David on apartment buildings, bomb threats to Jewish stores and demonstrations calling for Israel’s eradication, Jews speak of alarm as pro-Palestinian sentiment surges. This feels, to many European Jews, like the same blindness or insouciance that allowed millions of their forbears to be sent to Nazi camps to be gassed. It is precisely to that time that images of slain Jewish babies and grandmothers in the Jewish homeland have transported them. “Wir Haben Angst,” or “We Are Scared,” was the headline across this week’s cover of Der Spiegel, the leading German newsmagazine, over photographs of four German Jews, one of them a 90-year-old Holocaust survivor, Ivar Buterfas-Frankenthal, who said, “We Jews are once again easy targets.”

Persons: David, ”, Joel Rubinfeld, Samuel Lejoyeux, Frank, Walter Steinmeier, Der Spiegel, Ivar Buterfas, “ Organizations: daubed, Belgian, Union of Jewish Students of France Locations: Europe, Israel, Gaza, Berlin, ”, German

☆ Peace, a Forgotten Word, Renews its Claim in the Holy Land
▼ + stars: | 2023-10-22 | by ( Roger Cohen | More About Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +2 min

Awad Darawshe, shot in the abdomen, bled to death under the stage at the trance music festival that Hamas gunmen transformed into a killing field. A Palestinian Israeli paramedic, he died in a desperate attempt to save the lives of Jews at the Tribe of Nova peace-and-love gathering that marked the Jewish holiday of Sukkot. The peacemakers are in the minority as a devastating invasion of Gaza looms. That state of drift, in which peace had become a forgotten or even risible word, now feels untenable. The notion that the Palestinians would drift passively off into the ether as Israel normalized relations with Arab states like Bahrain or Morocco looks more misplaced than ever.

Persons: Awad Darawshe, Darawshe, Yossi, “, ”, Mohammad Darawshe, peacemaking, Benjamin Netanyahu’s Organizations: Palestinian Authority, West Bank Locations: Palestinian, Gaza, Israel, Bahrain, Morocco

☆ Europe’s ‘Tormented History’ Drives an Ambitious Macron Protégé
▼ + stars: | 2023-09-01 | by ( Roger Cohen | More About Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

This was scarcely business as usual for a minister whose habitual obligations include dealing with rail strikes and airport meltdowns. But Mr. Beaune, 42, has earned a reputation as an iconoclast driven by personal conviction, chief among them a passionate identification with the idea of a united Europe. “I have a small piece of this tormented history in me, and that is the history of all Europeans,” Mr. Beaune, a man of boyish face, candid gaze and artfully unkempt beard, said in an interview. “We are a continent of people, families and nations torn apart. We must recall that the European Union is a daily miracle.”

Persons: “, ” Organizations: European Locations: Kyiv, Clément Beaune, Ukrainian, Odesa, France, Auschwitz, Beaune, Europe, European Union

For over six years, President Emmanuel Macron has struggled to convince the French that he is a man of dialogue. He went on a countrywide listening tour to calm the storms of the Yellow Vest uprising, convened a citizen convention on climate policy, and created a council of politicians and members of civil society to discuss France’s most pressing issues. But he has generally remained a top-down leader, one who listens before deciding but rarely talks of compromise. Now, more isolated, he is trying political outreach. It looked like a pre-emptive strike aimed at heading off a potentially turbulent “rentrée” — the post-vacation convergence on Paris often marked by resentments reignited after a spell of downtime.

Persons: Emmanuel Macron, aloofness, Macron, resentments Locations: France, Paris

☆ A Former French President Gives a Voice to Obstinate Russian Sympathies
▼ + stars: | 2023-08-27 | by ( Roger Cohen | More About Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

PARIS — Nicolas Sarkozy, the former French president, was once known as “Sarko the American” for his love of free markets, freewheeling debate and Elvis. Of late, however, he has appeared more like “Sarko the Russian,” even as President Vladimir V. Putin’s ruthlessness appears more evident than ever. “European interests aren’t aligned with American interests this time,” he added. His statements, to the newspaper as well as the TF1 television network, were unusual for a former president in that they are profoundly at odds with official French policy. They provoked outrage from the Ukrainian ambassador to France and condemnation from several French politicians, including President Emmanuel Macron.

Persons: PARIS — Nicolas Sarkozy, Elvis, Vladimir V, Mr, Sarkozy, ”, me Vladimir Putin isn’t, I’ve, Le Figaro, Emmanuel Macron Organizations: European Union, NATO, TF1 Locations: Crimea, Ukraine, Russia, France, Ukrainian

Putin’s Forever WarVladimir Putin wants to lead Russians into a civilizational conflict with the West far larger than Ukraine. Far from the Potemkin paradise of Moscow, the war is ever visible. On the eastern shore of the lake, where white-winged gulls plunge into the steel-blue water, Yulia Rolikova, 35, runs an inn that doubles as a children’s summer camp. She is some 3,500 miles from the front, yet the war reverberates in her family and in her head. “I said, ‘No, you have an 8-year-old daughter, and it’s a much more important duty to be a father to her.’”

Persons: Vladimir Putin, Will, Yulia Rolikova, “, —, ”, ‘, ’ Locations: Ukraine, Lake Baikal, Siberia, Moscow

☆ At Funeral for Nahel M. Near Paris, Anguish, Anger and Racial Tensions
▼ + stars: | 2023-07-01 | by ( Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

The shooting of Nahel M. took place on Tuesday, followed by four nights of violent rioting in major French cities, and nothing suggested any return to calm as the young man’s funeral unfolded. His uncle, flanked by friends and security agents employed by the mosque, yelled abuse at anyone trying to film the proceedings. It would have been a dangerous provocation for any uniformed French police officer to appear. They would have gotten away with it, he said, but for the appearance of the apparently incriminating video that went viral. “The government always protects the police, a state within the state,” he said.

Persons: Nahel, Ahmed Djamai, ” Organizations: PARIS, French Locations: Badis, Nanterre

☆ France Splits Into Rival Camps Over Police Shooting of a Teenager
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-30 | by ( Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

President Emmanuel Macron has often denounced a new “incivility” in France and called for mutual respect. The fatal confrontation during a traffic stop in the western suburb of Nanterre has become a kind of Rorschach test of a divided French society. Whatever French people see in the ink blots seems to be increasingly ugly and irreconcilable. In a statement on Friday, Alliance Police Nationale, the largest police union, denounced the “savage hordes” and “vermin” behind the burning of 2,000 cars and the looting of several stores in riots on Thursday night that led to the arrests of over 800 people. Another police union, Unsa, joined Alliance in what it said was a call to “combat” in a “war” that “the government must take account of.”

Persons: Emmanuel Macron, Nahel, ”, Unsa Organizations: Alliance Police Nationale, Alliance Locations: France, Algerian, Nanterre

☆ Police Shooting in France Presents New Challenge for Macron
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-29 | by ( Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

“I was born French, but the police don’t see that,” he said. Éric Dupond-Moretti, the justice minister, declared that “those who spit on the police and on justice are the moral accomplices” of the acts of violence committed. The deadly confrontation started when Nahel ran a red light to avoid a first stop, the prosecutor said, and the officers approached the vehicle once it got stuck in traffic. But it resonated with police unions, which have accused politicians of ignoring the risks officers face in the field. Those unions have long argued that their job has become increasingly dangerous because of the government’s failure to address deep-seated social problems.

Persons: Kader Mahjoubi, ”, “, Éric Dupond, Moretti, Nahel Locations: Moroccan

☆ Putin’s Beast That Would Now Devour Him
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-25 | by ( Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

Over the course of a month I spent in the Russian capital, the red-and-black billboards of Yevgeny V. Prigozhin’s Wagner paramilitary group multiplied. “Join the team of victors!” they said, beneath an image of menacing mercenaries in balaclavas and masks, only their eyes visible. A possible implication was that the Russian forces on the other mushrooming Moscow billboards — regular soldiers recruited by the Ministry of Defense pictured above slogans like “Real Work!” or “Be a hero!” — were the losers of President Vladimir V. Putin’s reckless gamble in Ukraine. Easier to order a latte than dwell on lost lives in Mariupol. officer, abruptly emerged as the inscrutable president and Mr.

Persons: Yevgeny V, Prigozhin’s Wagner, ”, ” —, Vladimir V, heedless Muscovites, Prigozhin, Putin Organizations: Ministry of Defense Locations: Russian, balaclavas, Moscow, Ukraine, Mariupol

☆ Fear and Mayhem as Russia’s War Comes Home
▼ + stars: | 2023-06-12 | by ( Roger Cohen | Nanna Heitmann | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: 1 min

Abandoned cats and dogs roam vacant streets lined with blasted apartment buildings, rubble and crumpled cars in Shebekino, a Russian border town pounded by shelling from Ukraine. “I need insulin! I need insulin!” cried Lyudmila Kosobuva, 56, who said she was taking care of a diabetic friend too old to move. “We will not leave our land.”Such desperation and scenes of devastation are familiar to millions of Ukrainians confronting the Russian invasion of their country. But this was not Ukraine, it was Russia — a western sliver of the vast country where Ukrainian-backed forces have lobbed shells and missiles on residential areas.

Persons: ”, Lyudmila Kosobuva, “ Locations: Shebekino, Russian, Ukraine, Russia, Ukrainian

☆ French Diplomacy Undercuts U.S. Efforts to Rein China In
▼ + stars: | 2023-04-08 | by ( Roger Cohen | ) www.nytimes.com time to read: +1 min

President Emmanuel Macron of France complimented China’s top leader on the “very fragrant tea.” President Xi Jinping recalled “taking notes in order to understand” when he visited his father, then governor of the southeastern Guangdong province, in 1978. He also observed, extolling Chinese economic development, that the province now has “four cities with more than 10 million people.”It was an exchange of remarkable intimacy, the two leaders, tieless, sharing pleasantries in what was once the official residence of Mr. Xi’s father. The conversation came at the end of a three-day visit by Mr. Macron that was notable for the exceptional attention showered on him, and for the commitment in a concluding joint statement to a “global strategic partnership.”What exactly that will mean — beyond the commitments to the development of civilian nuclear power stations, the transition to carbon-neutral economies, sales of Europe’s Airbus aircraft and the promotion of pork exports — is not altogether clear. But at a time when Sino-American relations are in a deep freeze, Mr. Macron staked out an independent European position, and both leaders repeatedly lauded a “multipolar world,” thinly disguised code for one that is not American dominated.

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