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As the US and Israel Escalate in Iran, Europe Trades Alignment for Strategic Autonomy
Europe is no longer prepared to be drawn, by default, into an open-ended military operation in the Middle East.
Mar 23, 2026
What is unfolding across European capitals is not merely dissent over a particular conflict; it is the quiet reconfiguration of alliance behavior under conditions of escalating risk. The refusal voiced in Madrid—most starkly articulated by Spain’s Transport Minister, Óscar Puente, who declared that his country would not go “even around the corner” with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu—signals something more consequential than diplomatic disagreement.
Delivered in unusually blunt terms, his remark crystallized a broader political reality: Europe is no longer prepared to be drawn, by default, into an open-ended military escalation against Iran. It marks, in effect, the visible boundary of a strategic threshold the continent is no longer willing to cross.
For decades, transatlantic alignment functioned on the presumption of convergence: that when Washington moved, Europe would calibrate—but ultimately align. That presumption is now under strain. The prospect of a US-Israeli military aggression against Iran has exposed a widening gap between American strategic impulses and European risk tolerance.
The divergence is not ideological. It is structural. European governments are confronting a scenario in which escalation offers limited strategic clarity but immediate systemic exposure. They are being asked, in effect, to underwrite a conflict defined by uncertain objectives, fluid escalation dynamics, and a disproportionate economic burden—without corresponding influence over its conduct or conclusion.
The era of automatic convergence is giving way to one of selective alignment, where interests are weighed more carefully, risks are more openly acknowledged, and participation in conflict is no longer the default expression of alliance.
Spain’s position, far from anomalous, crystallizes this dynamic. The refusal to facilitate or politically endorse escalation reflects a broader European instinct toward insulation. Berlin’s caution, Paris’s distance, and the European Union’s emphasis on deescalation all point in the same direction: a deliberate effort to decouple European stability from the volatility of a conflict it neither initiated nor controls.
At the center of this recalibration lies energy vulnerability. The Strait of Hormuz—through which between 17 and 20 million barrels of oil pass daily—remains the most immediate point of systemic exposure. Any disruption, even partial, would transmit shockwaves through European economies already navigating inflationary pressures and fragile growth trajectories. Oil prices hovering around $115 per barrel, with credible projections reaching $150-$175 under sustained disruption, are not abstract indicators; they are policy constraints.
This economic dimension has begun to reshape strategic language. Where earlier discourse emphasized deterrence and enforcement, current formulations increasingly prioritize stability, containment, and the avoidance of escalation spirals. The postponement of strikes on Iranian energy infrastructure, following what Washington described as “productive” engagement, underscores the extent to which strategic decisions are now bounded by economic risk.
Equally significant is the absence of decisive outcomes on the ground. The escalation has yet to produce the structural breakthroughs that would justify its expansion. Assertions of operational success coexist with the persistence of institutional continuity within Iran, where governing structures remain intact and operationally coherent. In strategic terms, the conflict has generated pressure without resolution—a condition that complicates both escalation and exit.
Under these circumstances, Europe’s posture begins to take on a different meaning. It is not hesitation, nor is it disengagement. It is a recalibration of agency. By declining automatic alignment, European states are asserting a form of strategic autonomy that had long been subordinated to alliance cohesion. The message is not framed in declarative terms, but its implications are unmistakable: Participation is no longer assumed; it is contingent.
This shift does not dissolve the transatlantic relationship, but it does redefine its operational boundaries. It introduces friction where there was once fluidity, and conditionality where there was once reflex. Most importantly, it signals that the costs of alignment—economic, political, and strategic—are now subject to explicit calculation rather than implicit acceptance.
The significance of Spain’s stance, therefore, lies not in its rhetoric, but in what it reveals about the evolving architecture of Western power. The era of automatic convergence is giving way to one of selective alignment, where interests are weighed more carefully, risks are more openly acknowledged, and participation in conflict is no longer the default expression of alliance.
In that sense, Europe’s refusal to go “even around the corner” is not a momentary divergence. It is an early indicator of a deeper transformation—one in which the boundaries of Western cohesion are being redrawn in real time.
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11,000 Children Among Tens of Thousands ‘Waiting for Surgery’ in Cuba Due to US Blockade
Cuba's Deputy Foreign Minister Carlos Fernandez de Cossio said he hoped the people of the United States would ask, "Why does our government treat the whole population of Cuba this way?"
Mar 23, 2026
More than 96,000 Cubans, including 11,000 children, are "waiting for surgery" due to a fuel shortage caused by the American blockade, the country's deputy foreign minister, Carlos Fernandez de Cossio, said on Sunday.
The numbers cited by the minister on NBC's "Meet the Press" on Sunday were first reported earlier this month by Cuban Minister of Public Health José Ángel Portal Miranda, who explained that President Donald Trump's policy of “energy asphyxiation," using tariffs to threaten countries out of importing fuel to Cuba, has devastated its National Health Service.
The policy has left Cuba unable to import oil from abroad for more than three months, reducing its fuel supply by about 90% and leading to periodic blackouts and strict energy rationing.
Using the severely limited electricity at its disposal, Cuba's health system has been forced to prioritize continuing cancer treatments and other lifesaving procedures, putting those awaiting non-urgent surgeries on the sidelines.
Last month, a specialist at a hospital in Holguín told Diario de Cuba that the surgeries canceled included "uncomplicated hernias, cataract surgeries, some non-urgent gynecological procedures, and scheduled orthopedic surgeries."
Other healthcare professionals said that nobody was being admitted to the hospital for tests and that it was running low on basic supplies like syringes, IV tubing, and antibiotics, which could not be delivered due to fuel shortages. Most of those that have been used had to be donated by family members or purchased for exorbitant prices on the black market.
Jorge Barrera, a reporter for CBC News, spoke with patients and employees at Havana’s National Institute of Cardiology and Cardiovascular Surgery this weekend and found it to be at about half capacity, and that nonessential care has been virtually all suspended.
"Even though the health system is a point of pride for Cuba... something that they export to the rest of the world," Barrera explained, "because of this crisis, because of the impact it's had on the skyrocketing prices, it's just not enough for them to make ends meet. So people are quitting... to find other ways to make money to feed their families."
Experts with the United Nations have condemned the blockade of Cuba as "a serious violation of international law." Condemnations have grown louder over the past week as Trump said he believed he'd have "the honor of taking Cuba" after it collapsed.
De Cossio said he hoped the people of the United States would ask "Why does our government treat the whole population of Cuba this way?" and that they'd "understand that it's not correct to treat another nation the way the US is doing simply to try to achieve political goals."
The US blockade of Cuba is largely unpopular with the American public. A poll published last week by YouGov found that just 28% of adult US citizens said they approved of the US blocking oil shipments to the country, while 46% said they opposed it.
Asked by anchor Kristen Welker about suggestions from Trump that Cuba would collapse "on its own" without the need for the US to intervene militarily, De Cossio retorted, "What does 'on its own' mean when it’s being forced by the United States?"
Prior to Trump's further measures to isolate Cuba in January, the US had placed Cuba under an economic embargo for more than 60 years, which severely hampered the country's economic development and has cost Cuba trillions of dollars since it began, according to the UN.
"It’s a very bizarre statement, and it’s claimed by most US politicians repeatedly that Cuba will collapse on its own," De Cossio said. "Then why does the US government need to employ so many resources, so much political capital, so many human resources to try to destroy the economy of another country? Evidently, it implies that the country does not have the characteristics to collapse on its own."
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Israel Didn’t ‘Drag’ the US Into War—American Hawks Have Wanted This for Decades
Blaming Israel alone for this catastrophe lets US leaders off the hook for their actions.
Mar 20, 2026
The US and Israel have launched a deadly—and spreading war—against Iran. Since the conflict could easily become one of the drawn out and catastrophic wars that President Donald Trump postured against when campaigning, many are asking if Israel dragged Trump into this disaster. But while Israel definitely lobbied the White House to attack Iran—and it is partnering with the US in the war—it did not “drag” the US into it.
The truth is, leaders in the US were all too willing to launch this war on their own. We need to hold them accountable—and to beware of fringe, antisemitic conspiracy theorists who blame Jewish people or institutions for the Trump administration’s own well-documented militarism.
Netanyahu’s Influence
There is no question that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and other Israeli leaders pushed the US to join them in attacking Iran.
Both Netanyahu and the Israeli military’s chief of staff visited Washington just weeks before the war. And when asked why the US attacked Iran when it did, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio pointed to Israel’s influence. "We knew that there was going to be an Israeli action,” Rubio said. “We knew that that would precipitate an attack against American forces, and we knew that if we didn’t preemptively go after them before they launched those attacks, we would suffer higher casualties.”
While Netanyahu has been pushing for a war like this, he was not pushing an unwilling or reluctant US government.
More recently, Joe Kent—the director of the National Counterterrorism Center—resigned in opposition to the war, saying that “it is clear that we started this war due to pressure from Israel and its powerful American lobby.”
Most Americans opposed the war before it started, and it has proven divisive among the president’s highest profile MAGA supporters. The White House has been vague and contradictory on why it wanted to attack Iran, what the goals of the war are, and how long it will last.
If Americans do not want the war, and the White House cannot explain it, it is reasonable to conclude that it is driven by some outside force. And given Netanyahu’s long-standing belligerence toward Iran—which he has claimed was an imminent threat for 30 years while positioning himself as the one who could defeat it—and Trump’s closeness with the Israeli leader, the notion that the US has been pulled into Israel’s war is a fair conclusion to draw.
But in addition to the fact that this war is the latest and most extensive example of a global rampage by Trump’s Pentagon, there has been enthusiasm in Washington for decades to attack Iran in particular. And while Netanyahu has been pushing for a war like this, he was not pushing an unwilling or reluctant US government. Blaming Israel for this catastrophe lets US leaders off the hook for their actions.
A Half Century of US Hostility to Iran
US hostility toward Iran goes back more than half a century. In 1953, the CIA collaborated with British intelligence and authoritarian Iranian forces to overthrow the democratically elected government of Mohammed Mossadegh—a leader who sought to nationalize Iran’s oil, which the US and United Kingdom saw as a threat. The coup installed Mohammed Reza Pahlavi as Iran’s monarch, and his regime—which was supported and armed by Washington—ruled the country through widespread torture and other severe political repression.
When the Iranian Revolution overthrew Pahlavi’s government in 1979, revolutionaries associated the US government with the old regime and took US embassy staff hostage. The hostage crisis marked a turning point, with Washington adopting a hostile stance against Iran ever since. This has centrally involved US-imposed economic sanctions against Iran, which have devastated generations of Iranians—denying them lifesaving and life-easing medicines and crashing Iran’s currency.
Washington also has a long history of military violence against Iran and its people. The US armed both sides of the horrific Iran-Iraq War of the 1980s, and the US Navy shot down an Iranian civilian airplane in 1988, killing all 290 people onboard. During Trump’s first term, he unilaterally backed the US out of a nuclear agreement—which Iran was fully complying with, according to the United Nation’s nuclear watchdog agency—in favor of what he called the “Maximum Pressure” campaign. This involved deploying US naval ships off the coast of Iran and almost bombing the country in 2019 (Trump called off the attack “10 minutes before” warplanes were supposed to strike). In 2020, as part of the same campaign, Trump assassinated Iranian military and political leader General Qasem Soleimani in Iraq.
In fact, Donald Trump has publicly called for attacking Iran with the military since 1980. In his assaults on Iran during his first and second terms, Trump is following through on long-held desires. But those desires are not his alone—there has been a decades-long drive for war against Iran in a powerful section of Washington’s foreign policy establishment. A popular saying in the Beltway during the US buildup toward invading Iraq in 2003 was “everyone wants to go to Baghdad; real men want to go to Tehran.”
Figures like John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser; Mike Waltz, Trump’s current US ambassador to the UN; and Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who commands a powerful position in the Senate and agitated for this war, all embody Washington’s deeply rooted and powerfully positioned Iran war lobby. When Trump mused in 2020 about destroying Iranian cultural sites with US air strikes in 2020, now Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said, “I don’t care about Iranian cultural sites.”
These attitudes are not expressions of some manipulation by Israel. They wholly belong to the American men at the helm of Washington’s war machine.
A Stronger—and More Dangerous—US-Israel Partnership
The US also, of course, has a long history of arming Israel and providing cover for the state’s crimes against the Palestinians and many others.
The close strategic relationship between the US and Israel began in 1967, when Israel invaded and occupied the West Bank and Gaza, as well as parts of Egypt, Lebanon, and Syria. The state’s aggression helped the Cold War-driven Pentagon realize its strategic value in fighting against Soviet influence. Since then, the two countries have collaborated militarily in numerous covert and open military operations and full-scale wars. And both presidents Joe Biden and Trump supported Israel’s genocide in Gaza, providing Israel $22 billion in military aid from 2024 to 2025 alone.
The war on Iran is a joint US and Israeli venture. Stopping it requires us to confront the militarism of both countries.
Israel has more power in its relationship with the US than it once did. When the US invaded Iraq in 1991 and Saddam Hussein launched missiles at Israel to draw the country into the war and divide Arab allies of the US, President George H.W. Bush told Israel not to respond. Israel followed orders and held. It is hard to imagine Israel standing down similarly today. But this new level of Israeli power is resulting in greater collaboration between Washington and Tel Aviv, with Washington all too willing to make sure its partner conducts its ever more aggressive actions with impunity.
Today’s war against Iran, now spreading across the region and beyond, reflects decades of close military partnership, escalating to new intensity under the leadership of Benjamin Netanyahu and Donald Trump—who have more in common than their far-right politics. Both leaders face political and legal challenges at home, and both see war as a distraction from those problems.
They also see the opportunity to consolidate Washington and Tel Aviv’s global and regional domination, respectively. Iran remains the most significant challenger to the US and Israel in the Middle East, so Israel certainly didn’t have to “drag” an unwilling US into war against Iran.
Holding Our Own Leaders Accountable
Another reason to be careful about the argument that this is “Israel’s war” is that it easily aligns with antisemitic conspiracy theories that suggest that shadowy Jewish institutions are manipulating Washington to act against its interests.
It is not antisemitic to notice or criticize the outsized role that Israel plays in US politics and especially in this war. But the loudest voices arguing that this is a “war for Israel” are of far-right figures like Marjorie Taylor Greene and Tucker Carlson—whose promotion of antisemitism is well known—and now Joe Kent, who previously associated with (and distanced himself from, as his profile in politics grew) antisemites like Nick Fuentes, Paul Gosar, and Greyson Arnold. Their prominence in the conversation demands vigilance and clarity that antisemitism has no place in our emerging anti-war movement.
The war on Iran is a joint US and Israeli venture. Stopping it requires us to confront the militarism of both countries. At a time when officials like Rubio are shrugging off their own responsibility in this catastrophe, the people of this country need to hold them accountable for their actions and stop this war.
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