Sanchez and the angry voices of Europe

This week we’ve learned the extent to which On November 24, 2023, Spain’s foreign policy changed forever. When Pedro Sánchez caused a rift with Israel by calling for a Palestinian state in that place and the emotions that were generated at that timeMore important: At the Rafah crossing when the Israelis were awaiting the release of the first hostages taken with wounds on October 7.

Then there was foreign policy at the service of the President’s personal theoretical projection of the governmentwhich has transferred to it the same divisive business that it applies to internal politics. They have exported the wall without regard to national interests.’ This was already a symptom during his investiture speech, in a paragraph that advanced his international statement for this legislature and in which he criticized “the traditional Argentine right overwhelmed by the deceptive reactionary speech of Javier Mieli”.

Sánchez has abandoned any hint of diplomatic discretion, usually above ideological disagreements there are state interests that go beyond them. In a matter of days, Spain has ruined its historic status as a uniquely legitimate Mediterranean interlocutor to build bridges between Israel and the Arab countries. And it has dynamited the fraternal bond it had built over centuries with Argentina.

in both cases, Riding the wave of emotional politics: Sanchez has the ambition to move forward. He knows that Benjamin Netanyahu’s thoughtless and deadly response to Hamas’s heartless aggression is weakening Tel Aviv’s cause in the eyes of international public opinion, partly due to the irrigation of anti-Semitism, but above all for natural reasons Feelings of compassion Anyone who has to face injustice and suffering; and knows it well Fear Miley’s aggressive insults against “social justice” call for the abolition of the welfare state, which has awakened across Europe with the memory of the recent great crisis.

Sánchez has read the global moment and is an expert in disruptive politics because he is one of its pioneers. The president also believes that he has the same forecast that Carlo Bastiasin told Pablo R. Suánzes in his great report last Sunday: maybe soon European institutions will be radicalised and will also echo “angry voices”. International polarization. Yesterday, Minister José Manuel Alberes accused Ursula von der Leyen’s European People’s Party, which has been supporting the government, of joining hands with extremists and warned of a return to a “violent and supportless Europe”.

In this context, Sánchez repeats the framework of 23-J, enters the wasted mass of Yolanda Díaz, distracts attention from the collapse of the government that led to his impossible majority and, thanks to Miley, puts his wife’s judicial problems as a matter of state. Threatening referendum against the press and judges,

At the same time, the President redefines its European dimensionTo which he has always been very sensitive because it brings forth an important internal force. The left will lose power in Europe and the far right will have more influence, but the PSOE will remain the majority national group among social democrats. With the German chancellor weakened, Sánchez, in his characteristic style, tries to take a kind of ideological leadership among the European left: Either with us or against democracy,

European elections have never been more important and citizens have never been more aware of what Europe means. In an interview with Economist Emmanuel Macron warns the EU after his disappointing speech at the Sorbonne “It can break very quickly”,

The Russian invasion of Kharkiv, while Vladimir Putin and Xi Jinping shake hands, places the continent and its repository of universal values ​​under an existential threat, and the eventual victory of Donald Trump only adds to the urgency. Joint Investments in Defence. Europe must also rapidly increase industrial spending and move towards a true single market across all sectors If you want to be competitive and ensure the prosperity of its citizens. Any progress towards inevitable strategic autonomy will require a unified voice and fresh transfers of sovereignty. Either the EU will respond as a unified entity or it won’t,

Paradoxically, in this process we also have to take into account the growing influence of populism. The EPP will be the central party, controlling the Commission and the Council and having a majority in the European Parliament. popular The Spaniards would be the second national group after the Germans. The grand coalition with social democrats and liberals is not in danger, but The novelty would be that the EPP would have an alternative majority on the right Which suggests possible restrictive compromises in the Green Agenda or immigration policy.

The deciding factor at that time would be the Italian prime minister, Giorgia Meloni, who since coming to power has developed a pragmatic approach towards the EU to take advantage of Italy’s weight. Von der Leyen established the limits on Thursday: to be pro-European, pro-Ukraine and pro-rule of law. In order not to destroy the moral authority of the European project, it will be necessary to demand respect for the values ​​of liberal humanism, which he does not follow when he attacks nuclear freedom as in the press or when his ministers send racist messages. But it is funny to see Sanchez tearing his clothes, he, who went to the Chigi Palace to demand a “more Mediterranean Europe” with his and with whom you will have to deal with immigration,

Meloni’s practical wisdom In contrast to Vox’s religious denialismWhich knows no other dynamic than an internal rejection of any transversal agreement, while maintaining a notorious tactical pact with Sánchez to help block the option and trap the PP in a clamp.

After the good experience of Catalonia, Alberto Núñez Feijoo has opted for a framework of moderation and “calm dialogue” for these elections. The final approval of the 9-J amnesty will take place just a few days later, which will continue to provoke the biggest series of institutional conflicts in the entire democracy. These elections are also a referendum on whether the president will validate the authoritarian impulses against the rule of law he introduced during his five days in office in April. Today’s demonstration in Madrid will give us a temperature reading of the alternative’s mobilisation potential.