Why are Europeans turning towards authoritarian and populist demagogues?
Last week, one study by two European think tanks said one-in-three Europeans would vote authoritarian or support a populist party. Among the reasons are the perceived elitism in the traditional left and right-leaning parties.
The centre appears to be eroding, leaving people who are struggling with high inflation, energy, and uncertain futures looking for answers elsewhere.
Opinion polling from the Pew Research Center also found that 69 percent of the French population is dissatisfied with democracy, Italy 62 percent, Poland 47 percent and Spain 68 percent.
All are facing upcoming elections.
Another study, out on Tuesday (27 October), by the US-based Action for Democracy, drew similar conclusions and found that shaky allegiances between far-right parties in Europe are creating the scaffolding for possible future leadership under an authoritarian bent.
I say shaky because populist far-right parties have a notorious track record of finding common ground but then falling apart later.
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Finland’s president has caused a minor EU diplomatic fiasco by phoning Russian president Vladimir Putin out of the blue.
Finland’s Alexander Stubb sat down together with Norwegian prime minister Jonas Gahr Støre in Helsinki on Tuesday (27 October) and “initiated” the call to Putin, in what was already a submissive gesture in protocol terms.
Their discussion lasted 90 minutes and was “frank and substantive”, Stubb’s readout said, while Støre said he had “stressed the importance of de-escalation”.
But Putin told them he would make zero concessions, for instance on Ukrainian territories he claims are now Russian.
Putin “assessed the current situation in the Ukraine conflict zone, reiterating its root causes and emphasising that a just and lasting peace would be possible only if the interests of the Russian Federation are considered in full and without any conditions attached”, the Kremlin readout said.
Putin also belittled them by saying “the EU and Nato’s confrontational policies … result in prolonging the hostilities”.
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Two graphs show that Ukrainians are currently attacking at least as much as Russians. They are also advancing just as often.
The map, meanwhile, illustrates the territory Russians have captured in Donbas this year. It is smaller than in previous years.
New tanks and other equipment have begun appearing in Russian storage facilities. Russia is preserving them, possibly for another war.
Videos of the day: a Russian quad bike accident at the front; a Russian worker climbing an anti-drone net; Ukrainian children playing with a Russian drone.
Part of the population still believes that Russia is winning the war. It does not matter that it has failed to subjugate Kyiv for more than four and a half years, or to capture Donbas even after 12 years. It still has 20 percent of Donetsk oblast left to occupy — not 10 percent, as Russian president Vladimir Putin claims.
Of course, victory in war can be measured in different ways, and the movement of the front is not always decisive. But when it comes to activity at the front itself, the battlefield is essentially frozen. And Russian momentum is far weaker than it was at this time a year ago.
In today’s Ukraine Battlefield update, we present two graphs and one map showing that Russia is not currently winning the war on the battlefield.
The first graph suggests that Ukrainians are now launching attacks more frequently than Russians. It was published by the Ukrainian account Oko Hora.
It calculated the ratio of attacks on the basis of data from the Ukrainian general staff. The staff reports the number of engagements and the number of Russian attacks, meaning that the difference between them indicates Ukrainian attacks.
This methodology may not be precise, but other battlefield reports also suggest far greater Ukrainian activity than a few months ago or last year.
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The EU plans ‘massive’ investment in Australia’s critical minerals sector as it seeks to make Canberra a major partner in reducing the bloc’s current reliance on China.
“Since we wish to diversify away from China, then one of the most likely partners has to be Australia,” said the EU’s ambassador to Australia, Lawrence Meredith, who added that the bloc’s security and defence partnership, agreed with Canberra earlier this year, also relies on co-operation on critical minerals.
Speaking at the International Mining and Resources Conference in Sydney on Tuesday (27 October) Meredith said that the bloc would be “massively investing in critical minerals.”
EU and Australian trade officials are currently working on a bilateral trade agreement, with a view to concluding negotiations in early 2027, and a Memorandum of Understanding on critical minerals access is set to be part of it.
Australian officials appear eager to partner with the EU.
On Tuesday, Australia’s resources minister Madeline King said that it would revamp its own critical minerals strategy to put greater emphasis on refining and processing in an attempt to curb China’s dominance.
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Donald Trump’s 9 October diesel deal with Vladimir Putin left Europeans – including Ukraine – out in the cold, as US dollars will now become key aid in the financing of Russia’s war.
In the meantime, hybrid attacks using drones and sabotage are escalating across Europe. Intelligence agencies warn Russia will be escalating them in the next months, and even consider a “limited military attack”, as Danish intelligence warned late September.
EUobserver spoke to Robert Pszczel, former Nato information bureau chief in Moscow, about European defence and information strategy.
Pszczel is a long-time Polish diplomat in Warsaw and Brussels, now working with a Polish think tank, Centre for Eastern Studies (Ośrodek Studiów Wschodnich, OSW).
He closely follows Russia’s hybrid war and European defence strategy.
We see the US deprioritising Europe in their defence and diplomacy. What should our response be?
Let’s not mix our views of this administration’s policy with our strategic relations with the US. Why would we want to help with the process of decoupling? Do we want to give people in the US administration who marginalise the value of alliances arguments for disengagement? Because for me, that’s what ramblings about a European Defence Union do. The paradox is that this idea really appeals to die-hard MAGA isolationists because it gives them an excuse for undermining the Nato alliance.
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This year, in France, a small book was published with major implications for the future of Europe:Notre déni de guerre [Our Denial of War] written by a military historian, Stéphane Audoin-Rouzeau.
Audoin-Rouzeau specialises in a subject that was long regarded a niche field: the First World War.
He delves into facts, developments, and societal, political and social undercurrents that are long past and therefore seem of little concern to most people.
But according to him, these matters are more relevant to modern Europeans than ever before. The more time passes, the more parallels he sees between the period around the First World War and the times we now live in.
With one very significant parallel: the denial that war is drawing nearer.
His argument is that Europeans have enjoyed peace for so long that they no longer know what war is. They don’t recognise it, cannot see it coming and therefore don’t know how to avert it.
Many have come to believe that if they don’t attack anyone or declare war on anyone, no one will attack them in return – the typical logic of people who have only known peacetime.
Europe’s problem, in his view, is that not everyone in the world lives in peacetime, and that others therefore operate according to a different logic – the logic of wartime.
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New EU legislation will waive airfares for people accompanying disabled passengers if the companion’s presence is deemed required by the airline.
Updated passenger rights greenlit by MEPs last week (20 October) close a loophole allowing airlines to turn away passengers with reduced mobility.
Once approved, agreed changes mean airlines will allow disabled people the opportunity to travel with companions free of charge – if required for safety reasons – from 23 October 2027.
Ministers in the council had proposed alternative legislation that would allow airlines to collect taxes and charges for required companions. But in a win for disabled rights, negotiators for the European Parliament succeeded in insisting such charges be waived.
Rapporteur Matteo Ricci, an Italian MEP for the Socialists & Democrats (S&D), called the decision a “significant step forward” following the vote in Strasbourg.
This comes after a previous vote in July required airlines to fully cover the replacement of mishandled mobility equipment and allow people with disabilities or reduced mobility to sit next to their companions at no extra charge.
Companions not required by airlines must pay
Under new rules, passengers already travelling with an accompanying person not required by airlines – such as a personal assistant to help with their needs – will still need to pay for an extra ticket.
This was not made clear by Ricci who told reporters last week: “All people with disabilities or reduced mobility will have the right to have a companion traveling with them free of charge.”
In reality, the text adopted at plenary allows airlines to determine based on safety judgements whether or not companions of disabled people can travel for free.
So under new rules, many people with disabilities may not be able to bring companions free of charge.
“This leaves a gap for passengers who need personal assistance, but whose accompaniment is not required by the airline,” said Maltese S&D-group MEP Alex Agius Saliba. The co-chair of parliament’s disability group told EUobserver: “Their support needs are no less real, and the additional ticket can remain a financial barrier.”
Advocacy group the European Disability Forum (EDF) said when a provisional agreement was reached that updated enforcement of passenger rights offers “insufficient protection” for disabled passengers.
Disability rights whack-a-mole
Daniel Casas, policy officer at the EDF, thinks new rules are a step in the right direction.
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Ministers want to speed up and simplify the payment of farming subsidies by taking control of the EU’s multi-billion euro farming payment schemes, under a deal reached late on Monday night (26 October).
The agreement at a meeting of EU agriculture ministers in Brussels finalises the negotiating position of EU governments on the future of the bloc’s Common Agricultural Policy in its next seven-year budget.
The ‘negotiating box’ prepared by the Irish EU council presidency earlier this month for the 2028-34 multi-annual financial framework spared agricultural subsidies provided by the common agricultural policy from cuts worth a total of €141bn but proposed three-percent cuts, worth €24.6bn, to funding for National and Regional Partnership Plans (NRPP), which are intended to streamline the distribution of EU cash to governments for a variety of different policies including agriculture and fisheries.
The idea behind the NRPPs is to set up one single fund to provide support for farmers.
Each EU country would be expected to develop a single comprehensive plan outlining the reforms and investments it intends to implement from 2028 to 2034 and how it plans to use EU funds.
EU governments agreed on Monday that this planning process should be designed to give them far greater autonomy. They say that the recommendations the commission makes to member states regarding the design of support programs should not be binding.
The new system is set to prioritise ‘active farmers’, which sets a threshold of a minimum level of agricultural activity for farmers, as well as young farmers and small farmers.
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EUobserver is proud to have an editorial partnership with Europod to co-publish the podcast series “Briefed” hosted by Léa Marchal. The podcast is available on all major platforms.
Find the full transcript below:
Israelis are heading to the polls today for legislative elections. It is the first national vote since 2022, and a decisive moment for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who is running again.
So who are the main candidates, and what is actually at stake? First, a quick look at where we are.
A lot has happened since the last elections in 2022. Since the Hamas terrorist attack on 7 October 2023, which killed more than 1,100 people, the Israeli government has cracked down on Gaza: the death toll is at 74,500 people, according to the Gaza Health Ministry. The number of people wounded is triple that.
While a ceasefire was signed last year, around 1,500 Palestinians have been killed since then. In the West Bank, settlement expansion has accelerated, with growing violence. Over the past three years, more than 10,000 Palestinians have been displaced.
So this is the context in which the elections are taking place. The current prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, is running for re-election, as there is no term limit for prime ministers in Israel. And he is no newcomer: he has spent around 16 years in power, though not consecutively.
Now, what do the polls say? According to several surveys published last Friday, Gadi Eisenkot is slightly ahead of Netanyahu. But neither is expected to reach an absolute majority.
So who is Gadi Eisenkot? He is Netanyahu’s rival, but politically he is closer to the current government’s line than you might expect.
He is a former chief of staff of the army, and he also served in Netanyahu’s war cabinet for several months after the 7 October attack.
He later left, accusing the prime minister of mismanaging events, and in particular of failing to anticipate the attack.
His son was killed in the war in Gaza in December 2023, which seems to have given him a certain sympathy among the public.
On the Palestinian question, he opposes the creation of a Palestinian state, and he does not challenge Israel’s policy of territorial expansion. He only promises to tackle settler violence, in the name of the rule of law.
Then there is the duo Naftali Bennett and Yair Lapid. Bennett briefly served as Prime Minister in 2021. The duo represent a centre-right line that does not differ hugely from Netanyahu’s.
On the left side of the political spectrum, there seems to be only one candidate: Yair Golan, of the Democrats party. He is the only one calling for the recognition of a Palestinian state.
He is also the candidate many Israelis abroad are coming home to vote for. The French daily newspaper Le Monde has published a long article interviewing Israeli expatriates around the world.
Most of them back Golan, who, according to several of those interviewed, represents the only hope of putting Israel back on the right track. But the polls suggest he is well behind the right-wing candidates. He would win around 10 seats in parliament, against 22 for Gadi Eisenkot and 19 for Likud, Netanyahu’s party.
In 2003, Chinese president Hu Jintao worried about what became known among the country’s leadership as the ‘Malacca dilemma.’
Some 80 percent of China’s imported crude passed through the Malacca strait which Beijing’s naval forces could not control.
This gave rise to a wider security doctrine of supply-chain resilience which became the basis for China’s transformation into the clean tech powerhouse it is today.
When the US–Iran war disrupted Middle Eastern oil flows this year, Xi Jinping called China’s early bet on wind and solar “forward-looking” – as recounted in a new paper from the London School of Economics’ Grantham Research Institute published on Monday (26 October).
The paper identifies green growth as “the answer” to geopolitical uncertainty. Clean tech isn’t just clean, it’s also secure and not dependent on imports. Plus, it delivers a “more durable pathway” to “economic resilience.”
Some governments want to expand fossil-fuel imports, or drill more oil or gas wells, arguing that a more diversified supply chain improves resilience. But the paper dismissed that.
Oil and gas are priced on global markets, so even producers are exposed to price shocks. More North Sea drilling would save UK households between £16 and £82 (€19 to €98) a year, the paper finds, citing Oxford University research, compared with £105 to £441 on a renewables and electrification pathway.
It’s interesting comparing how the two political systems respond to (hypothetical) supply shocks. In China, the mere threat of losing control of one strait was enough to transform energy politics gradually over many years.
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A historically-high number of voters have chosen parties classified as authoritarian or populist, according to new research looking at 31 countries across Europe, not just the EU.
Germany saw the starkest rise, with the Alternative for Germany (AfD) getting over 20 percent of the last national parliamentary vote, while in contrast parties classified as radical left split the 13.8 percent of votes between them.
The Authoritarian Populism Index, published by two European think tanks, EPICenter and the Nordics-based Timbro late last week (22 October), analyses parliamentary election results for 260 parties in 31 countries since 1946, or since the year free elections were first held.
The high support for populists is a result of mainstream parties not being able to “adequately address the concerns of our time,” Emelie Franzén, EPICenter’s research coordinator, told EUobserver.
The populists’ success is a “result of a lack of trust towards the elites,” Mateusz Michnik, economic analyst for EPICenter, told EUobserver. He also added that populists are more effective communicators than mainstream parties, especially in crisis situations, such as the Covid pandemic, the migration wave of 2015, or Russia’s 2022 attack on Ukraine.
The Index has been classifying populist parties since 2016, defining them as groups where representing the people above the elite is “a central organising principle of their political worldview,” the author says.
Reinhard Heinish, political science professor in Salzburg, told EUobserver that the report “combines different hard-to-measure concepts, and needs to interpreted with some caution.”
Despite this overarching characteristic, their profile is far from uniform, the report’s author, Andreas Johansson Heinö, Timbro’s director, warned.
“Most are culturally conservative, while economically they are almost evenly divided between left and right.” The populist parties included in the study tend to be eurosceptic, but only a minority supports leaving the EU, he added.
Throughout the 1950s and 1960s, about 10 percent of Europeans chose authoritarian or populist leaders. Since 2000, the number started to increase, reaching just under 30 percent in 2019.
Now, parties outside of the political mainstream have seats in 11 out of 31 European governments.
“Populists can ‘infect’ other political parties with populism,” Michnik said, which he thinks explains a surge of anti-migration policies across the continent.
Contrary to Germany, Bulgaria, and Norway, which recorded the largest increases in the past years, Hungary’s score radically decreased with the April elections that brought an end to Viktor Orbán’s rule.
In a historic turn of electoral tides, Brazil’s incumbent president Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva defeated far-right opponent Flávio Bolsonaro on Sunday (25 October,) alleviating fears that a Bolsonaro-dynasty comeback would topple the world’s fourth-largest democracy.
Following a disastrous first-round election for Lula on 4 October, in which he narrowly lost a majority in Brazil’s national congress, the Workers’ party leader overturned predictions to become the first president to win the second round of voting after losing the first one.
First-round voting gave 47 percent for former president Jair Bolsonaro’s son, Flávio, and his rightwing Liberal Party, whose voters mainly represent wealthy and emerging middle classes in the south of Brazil, as well as evangelical Christians, one of the largest religious groups in the country.
Lula’s northeastern, working class, multi-racial support base only made up 45 percent of all primary votes, but climted to 51.8 percent in Sunday’s second-round of the presidential election.
Despite setting a record in being the first Brazilian president to win four non-consecutive terms, Lula’s triumph still leaves room for possible conflict.
Bolsonaro, whose campaign capitalised on continuing the work of his divisive father, who is currently serving a 27-year prison sentence for plotting a coup after losing the 2022 election, refused to concede defeat – leaving an open window for history to repeat itself.
“We’ll request the annulment of these elections,” Bolsonaro told the press after votes had been counted, accusing Brazil’s Supreme Court of having “changed the rules of the game in the middle of the game,” by ordering polls to stay open for two more hours on Sunday.
What Brazil’s nationalist candidate declared as “unacceptable” was an idea initially intended to facilitate all Brazilians’ attendance at the polls, since multiple areas were reported to have been affected by public transport problems.
Bolsonaro’s issue with the courts is another link in the chain of power-hungry promises he had made during his campaign to “re-democratise this country”.
Without guidance on what that could mean beyond his publicised desire to extend the duration of presidential terms, many voters fearfully associated his remarks with a potential coup, or with Jair Bolsonaro’s infamous liking for authoritarian rulers – including Brazil’s own 1964-1985 dictatorship.
‘Lula’s army’
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Some Belgian spies have questioned EUobserver’s report of a cover-up in favour of an allegedly corrupt Belgian ex-EU commissioner, while international commentary focused on his possible Russia ties.
EUobserver revealed on Friday (23 October) that Hugues Brulin, a director in the Belgian intelligence service (VSSE), had exchanged WhatsApp messages with ex-EU commissioner Didier Reynders, which may have been part of a criminal conspiracy to block VSSE reports into Reynders’ alleged wrongdoing.
But according to “several” VSSE sources who spoke to Belgian daily Le Soir, Brulin, who had been the number three in the VSSE hierarchy, had been in charge of logistics, Human Resources, and IT, but did “not have the power to block enquiries or put his nose into dossiers”.
Brulin did have access to secret dossiers only in case the number one and two directors in the VSSE were absent, and he had to sign off on special operations, called “BIMs” in VSSE jargon, which included measures such as phone wiretaps or home intrusions to place bugs, but this situation occurred just once during his tenure, Le Soir said.
But even if that was all true, Brulin still used to have the power to end the careers of VSSE officers who had looked into Reynders, on grounds of flimsy infractions, as happened in at least three cases, according to EUobserver’s sources.
“This article feels like a liberation. I don’t know if it really is one, but it feels like one … Thanks again in the name of all the normal, honest, taxpaying Belgians,” one ex-VSSE contact told EUobserver, commenting on last Friday’s revelations.
And besides which, there are allegations that Reynders had other VSSE insiders who might have been better placed to act.
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Ukrainian pressure towards Velyka Novosilka has slowed, but not stopped.
The Russian offensive near Orikhiv has stalled, as elsewhere, and Z-channels are again looking for reasons why reality does not match their maps.
The weekend was marked by Storm Shadow missiles, which destroyed factories producing Iskander components.
Russians are attacking bridges in Zaporizhzhia.
Two people died on a train in Voronezh after a Ukrainian drone fell on it; according to the Russians, it was debris from a downed aircraft.
Russians destroyed a Czech Dita howitzer.
Maps of the day – Velyka Novosilka direction; Orikhiv
Videos of the day– destruction of the Czech Dita howitzer; Storm Shadow missiles; a tank destroyed a position on the frontline with direct fire; a MiG-29 shot down a drone.
Ukrainian pressure towards Velyka Novosilka has slowed, but not stopped. The battle for Dobropillia continues, but without any major developments. Today, therefore, attention turns to the section of the front that was the main focus in spring, when the Ukrainian army managed to clear hundreds of square kilometres and push the Russians out of 26 villages.
This is where the borders of three regions meet: Donetsk, Zaporizhzhia and Dnipropetrovsk oblasts. It has received less attention in recent months because there have been more active areas of the front, but the creeping Ukrainian counteroffensive has not stopped and the Russians must now seriously consider the risk it poses to their forces in the direction of Velyka Novosilka.
This town was one of the launching points for the unsuccessful Ukrainian offensive in summer 2023. The Russians captured it in early 2025 and have since moved slowly westwards and north-westwards. They have not got far at all. Following the events of spring, the front is now less than 15 km from Velyka Novosilka.
Now, under ideal circumstances, the Russian army risks losing some of the gains it has made in this sector during nearly two years of heavy fighting.
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“Tonight we celebrate victory, tomorrow we build the future,” said Radomir Sajčić, professor at Belgrade University, speaking on behalf of the students at their headquarters on Sunday’s evening (25 October). “The voice of the people is being heard”.
The student-backed list won Serbia’s parliamentary election at the weekend, in a vote that amounts to the biggest challenge so far to president Aleksandar Vučić’s long-standing grip on power.
And that night, Vučić (unexpectedly) acknowledged defeat. “Vox populi, vox dei,” [The voice of the people is the voice of God], he said, marking a significant moment in the Serbian political landscape that Vučić has dominated for more than a decade.
The 56-year-old politician served as prime minister from 2014 to 2017, then won the 2017 and 2022 presidential elections. Critics accuse him of authoritarianism, control over the media, and manoeuvring between the European Union, Russia, and China.
However, this years historic turnout (nearly 70 percent ), the highest since the break-up of Yugoslavia in 1992, has overturned his SNS party (Serbian Progressive Party).
In the 250-seat parliament, the Student’s List will have the majority – 140 seats, and second comes Vučić’s SNS with 104 seats. The remaining seats will be shared mainly between ethnic national-minority parties.
“It was effectively a referendum on president Aleksandar Vučić,” the Serbian pro-democracy group Kreni-Promeni, who backed the Students’ List, told EUobserver.
From student protests to electoral change
The opposition was unable to seriously challenge Vučić in the previous parliamentary elections, partly because of its fragmentation. However, a significant turning point in Serbian politics came in November 2024, when 16 people died after a canopy collapsed at the railway station in Novi Sad.
The tragedy then sparked massive demonstrations across Serbia, led primarily by students. Hundreds of thousands of people took part. They blamed the disaster largely on the government and its corruption.
The student protests gave rise to Vučić’s main challenger in this year’s elections: the Student List (SL). The 250 candidates running for parliament included individuals selected by students, primarily academics.
“The students have selected prominent citizens – experts in their own fields,” Miloje Savić, a volunteering poll observer, told EUobserver. “They know which values they are supposed to protect and represent,” he added.
The student electoral list was led by Ilija Srdanović, a professor at the Faculty of Medicine in Novi Sad.
The weekend result thus represent a major political breakthrough for a movement that emerged less than two years ago from protests against the government’s long-standing corruption.
For the SNS, this defeat is “a huge blow to him [Vučić]”, senior research associate at the University of Belgrade, Jelena Vasiljević told EUobserver.
But, as the poll winner and Vučić’s most successful opponent, the SL is not out of the woods yet.
Students smeared as ‘blockaders‘
Even as he acknowledged defeat, Vučić continued to use the same online rhetoric, referring to winners as the “students’ blockade list”. Vučić also warned of investor uncertainty and damage these results might have on the gas trade.
Serbia's Vučić after conceding defeat in election:
What brought us down is this verified revolution, which they carried out with direct support from various European countries, and the deep American state, the one against President Trump.
Taken together – the language and the economic warnings – offer an insight into how the SNS and Vučić will depict the incoming government.
“They would be framing the student movement as not as a legitimate political power, but as an extension of the protest movement and as a risk to economic stability,” Vanesa Valcheva, head of research at Balkan Free Media Initiative (BFMI), told EUobserver.
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The lower house of Czech parliament became a nighttime battleground for the future of the country’s public service media at the weekend, when MPs pushed through the abolition of public service media licence fees in the bill’s first reading in the chamber on Saturday (24 October).
Czech MPs voted to pass a bill that lays the groundwork to abolish TV and radio licence fees and move public media under the state budget.
The weekend vote was not yet a vote on the law’s final approval: the government coalition only needed to prevent the bill’s rejection which the opposition had sought.
The controversial vote was scheduled for 4.36am on Saturday – by no means a typical time for such a vote. Opposition parties had failed to postpone the vote, and also did not have enough numbers to reject the bill.
Out of 177 lawmakers present, 96 MPs voted in favour of the bill, while 81 opposition MPs voted to reject it. Prime minister Andrej Babiš did not take part in the vote.
MPs from the Czech Republic’s five opposition parties also failed to pass a proposal to return the bill for redrafting to the coalition formed by ANO (led by the PM) and the far-right parties Freedom and Direct Democracy (SPD) and Motorists to Themselves.
The bill will now go to the parliament’s media and culture committee. This will be followed by lengthy debate at the law’s second reading, where amendments may be submitted. The proceedings will likely last several days.
4.36am vote planned at last-minute
Babiš’s governing majority only added the agenda item for ending licence fees on the Chamber of Deputies’ (lower house of parliament’s) agenda on Friday morning. It even took by surprise the MPs of ANO, SPD and Motorists.
The coalition leadership formed by Babiš and foreign minister Petr Macinka (Motorists) had kept the plan secret all week, so that it would not become public and opposition parties could not prepare obstruction tactics.
Protesters had gathered outside the parliament through the night in the early hours of Saturday morning. Demonstrations carried on throughout the Czech Republic over the weekend.
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Israel’s election on Tuesday (27 October) could bring a new government without changing the country’s course. Having worked as a parliamentary adviser in the Knesset and later as executive director of Peace Now, I know how that can happen.
Many of the parties seeking to replace Benjamin Netanyahu are avoiding clear positions on the Israeli-Palestinian question, but some of their candidates may end up overseeing annexation they never campaigned for.
Israel’s previous coalition, led by Naftali Bennett in 2021, offers a warning.
Called the “government of change” because it ended Netanyahu’s 12-year run in office, it brought together a variety of parties, from Bennett’s rightwing party to Labor and Meretz, leftwing parties.
Its answer to profound ideological disagreements, particularly over the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, was to preserve the status quo. The coalition lasted roughly 18 months, and although it changed the tone of government, it left much of the policy towards the West Bank intact.
For example, Merav Michaeli, then Labor leader and transport minister, opposed settlement expansion.
Yet her ministry continued to implement previously approved infrastructure commitments, including substantial budgets for roads facilitating that expansion.
Through my work at Peace Now, I saw how the coalition’s status-quo agreement constrained her ability to challenge projects inherited from the previous government. A minister could thus find herself implementing a vision she opposed.
Today, the stakes are higher.
Another slice of the West Bank
Consider E1, between Jerusalem and the settlement of Ma’ale Adumim, where construction would threaten Palestinian territorial contiguity and the viability of a future Palestinian state.
The government has advanced tenders for all 3,401 planned housing units, with crucial stages of the tender process set to be completed before a new government takes office.
E1 exemplifies wider efforts to establish difficult-to-reverse facts: new settlement outposts, including in areas under Palestinian civil administration, expanding settlements and administrative changes that entrench Israeli control.
A successor government would have to intervene actively to reverse them.
These developments are backed by an explicit political vision. The current government’s guidelines and coalition agreements assert exclusive Jewish rights throughout the land of Israel and commit to advancing Israeli sovereignty in the West Bank.
Under Bezalel Smotrich, serving as a minister within the defence ministry, a new settlement administration and civilian positions have been established, shifting significant aspects of West Bank governance from military administration to civilian political control.
These structures will not disappear when their architects leave office. The far-right has equipped the state with both a vision and the machinery to advance it.
Inertia is not neutral when the machinery is already moving in one direction.
Parties seeking to replace Netanyahu need not necessarily agree on a final-status agreement with the Palestinians, but they must find enough common ground to commit to halting annexation and reversing the structures that enable it.
Those understandings belong in coalition negotiations, when parties still have leverage, rather than in battles left for individual ministers once they are in office.
Nor is this a distant constitutional question. Palestinians in the West Bank already face systematic violations of their basic rights and freedoms, from restrictions on movement and access to land to violence and forced displacement. Each new settlement and outpost deepens this injustice and makes the prospect of a political settlement more remote.
Facts on ground
The entrenchment of permanent Israeli control is creating a reality that is increasingly difficult to reverse, making political intervention more urgent with every passing year.
The current government’s response to growing international pressure illustrates the danger.
After the UK announced measures targeting settlements, foreign minister Gideon Sa’ar ordered the closure of its consulate in East Jerusalem. Britain considered expelling Israeli diplomats in response, and a compromise left a much smaller British mission operating.
The episode illustrates Netanyahu’s vision of a ‘Super Sparta’: an Israel preparing itself for international isolation rather than addressing the policies contributing to it.
A future government seeking to change that trajectory should start with two tasks.
‘Messianic minority’
First, it must take seriously the reasons behind international sanctions and address the policies driving them, including settlement expansion and settler violence. A messianic minority must not be allowed to drag Israel into international isolation and economic decline.
Second, the government should help European partners distinguish between Israel and the settlements, including through transparent supply chains and clear proof of origin, so that restrictions aimed at settlements do not spill over into the broader Israeli economy.
Both tasks require urgent and concrete policy changes, beyond a more moderate diplomatic tone.
European governments should not expect a new coalition, or even international sanctions themselves, to bring about these changes automatically. They need to make their expectations explicit, press prospective coalition partners to incorporate concrete commitments into their agreements, and judge the resulting government by its actions.
Without that pressure, politicians who never endorsed annexation may become useful idiots for a project they do not support, helping to consolidate a single undemocratic state in which millions of Palestinians are permanently denied equal rights and freedoms.
Preventing that outcome requires urgent political action, while a different future is still possible. Neither Israelis seeking change nor their European partners can afford to assume it will happen on its own.
EUobserver is proud to have an editorial partnership with Europod to co-publish the podcast series “Briefed” hosted by Léa Marchal. The podcast is available on all major platforms.
Find the full transcript below:
In Germany, the far-right party Alternative für Deutschland (AfD) won two state elections in September. Now, talks are underway to build coalitions. How close is the AfD to governing in these States?
In both Saxony-Anhalt and Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, the AfD won the elections a few weeks ago. But it does not have an absolute majority in either regional parliament.
As for the state of Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, the AFD has no prospect of forming alliances to secure a majority, and negotiations are well under way between the Social Democrats, the Greens and the Left Party to reach an agreement. Together, they hold an absolute majority.
But the situation is quite different in Saxony-Anhalt. What will most likely happen, is an alliance with the BSW, the party founded by Sahra Wagenknecht.
The BSW describes itself as radical left, fighting for social justice. But in practice, it takes a very hard line on migration. And it is also notably lenient towards Russia.
In the end, the BSW and the AFD share similar views on a number of things, so they have been talking to build a coalition. They haven’t announced any deal whatsoever for now.
But there are two things we should look at. First, the election of the AfD candidate as president of the regional parliament in Saxony-Anhalt. Tobias Rausch is the first AfD member to be landtag president.
He won thanks to votes from the AfD and the BSW. This would have been enough. But he even got 4 more votes.
Together, BSW and AFD have 44 votes, while Rausch received 48. That means at least four votes came from other parties, which are not supposed to cooperate with the far right. Some suspect they came from the CDU. But as Friedrich Merz pointed out, the ballot is secret, so there is no way to verify that.
Now, president of the regional parliament is not a particularly powerful position. But still, it is the first time the AfD has won it, and it came as a shock in Germany earlier this month.
So does this mean the same thing will happen when the regional prime minister is chosen? Well, not necessarily. The vote could take place in December. No date has been set yet. So there is plenty of time to negotiate a deal.
But the fact that the AfD and the BSW managed to agree on the parliament’s president shows that an agreement is conceivable.
There is something else worth noting. The two parties have just voted together on a non binding resolution on the war in Ukraine. In it, they call on Ukraine to capitulate to Russia, and demand an end to financial support for Kyiv. So again, this shows they share several positions.
And in the end, even if the AfD doesn’t manage to get its candidate, Ulrich Siegmund, elected as head of the state, the AfD and the BSW could still form a majority on many votes, just as they did on the resolution about Ukraine. Which would mean a change of policy for the region.
Before we wrap up, you might be wondering: what powers do German states actually have? Quite a lot, in fact. Education and culture, police and public security, media as well, since regional public broadcasters, for example, are governed by the states.
Each state has its own government. And the regional prime minister leads it, much like a prime minister would, at national level. The states are also represented in the Bundesrat, a kind of senate, which takes part in drafting national laws.
So yes, and AFD led regional government would mean a shift in local policies.
The Ukraine battlefield is the hottest part of Russia’s war on the West, but not the only one. The Kremlin is betting that sabotage, intimidation and other sub-threshold attacks will make Ukraine’s allies so distracted, scared and tired that they cut their support to Kyiv. Meanwhile Russia’s political warfare is reaping rewards in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
The Berlin-based, Oxbridge-educated Russia expert unpicks Kremlin influence operations in a dozen-plus countries. Her reporting is meticulous, the descriptions vivid, and the conclusion bleak: Russia is using the West’s own weakness to beat us.
One paradox is globalisation: the West’s main project since the collapse of communism, but which now undermines its sanctions efforts.
‘Eurasian roundabout’
China, North Korea, Iran and other countries in what Notte calls the “Eurasian roundabout” help Russia export and import what it needs to keep its war machine running.
Hard-headed shipping magnates in Dubai will not stop dealing with the “shadow fleet”, any more than Indian energy tycoons will shun cheap oil. It’s just business, they tell her.
But not only that.
Many in the mis-named “Global South” instinctively despise Ukraine as an American proxy. The irony is head-spinning: Ukraine is treated as a pariah for its ties to a supposed patron that has now all but abandoned it.
As well as exploiting anti-Americanism (whatever that means these days) Russia also draws on deep historical sympathies that are all but incomprehensible seen from the former captive nations of Europe.
Many influential Africans, for example, have bitter first-hand or inherited memories of US treatment of their continent in the Cold War, including support for apartheid-era South Africa.
They also have a rose-tinted view of the Soviet Union, which supported their liberation struggle. Some studied there. That Ukraine is the victim of a revanchist imperialist Russia makes no sense to them; interviewed by Notte, they struggle to see it as a real country.
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The US and Israeli-led war with Iran, launched in late February, and other military campaigns in the region have disrupted flights, leaving around 5,500 deportations that would normally receive support from the EU’s border agency Frontex unexecuted.
The disruption comes despite the Warsaw-based agency’s recent announcement that returns rose in the first half of 2026, with Syrians and Iraqis among the 10 nationalities most frequently deported.
Internally, however, Frontex appears concerned.
In July, it highlighted return problems because of the Middle East crisis, a broad swathe of conflicts that has seen various airspace closures over Bahrain, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Lebanon, Israel, Qatar, Syria, and the UAE.
It said roughly 4,000 returns had not been carried out because of direct cancellations or broader operational standstills, with member states halting the organisation or scheduling of Frontex-supported returns due to the Middle East conflicts.
By 30 September, that figure had climbed to 5,500.
Frontex document WK 9599/2026 INIT, made partially public on 2 July. Cites disruptions due to Middle East conflicts and returns to Syria and Afghanistan (Source: Frontex)
Although now open (as of publication), airspace restrictions, route availability and operational measures may be introduced, amended or lifted rapidly, sometimes with little notice.
European deportation setbacks typically involve everything from fragmented national systems, to people absconding, and to foreign states refusing to accept their own nationals. But war and conflict are now adding another layer of complications.
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