Free Republic

But it is the flow of people into the European Union that has had the greatest geopolitical impact, and helped to precipitate the British vote. Stabilizing Syria and permanently curbing the refugee flow could be one of the critical factors in determining whether Europe can steady itself politically. Before the refugee crisis, the European Union was already an unwieldy and unfinished entity. Its contradictions and imperfections were exacerbated by the economic crisis. Yet it was the onset of more than a million refugees marching through Greece and the Balkans toward Germany that may ultimately prove to be the most destabilizing...

BERLIN — With Israelis and Palestinians caught in another widening cycle of bloodshed, Secretary of State John Kerry met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of Israel in Berlin on Thursday and urged him to tone down the harsh language that American and European officials believe is fueling the violence. The message delivered on Thursday to Mr. Netanyahu, who claimed this week that a Muslim cleric had inspired the Holocaust, will be repeated in the coming days when Mr. Kerry meets the president of the Palestinian Authority, Mahmoud Abbas, whose own comments Mr. Netanyahu and others have blamed for provoking attacks....

As chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel leads a nation that prizes fiscal rectitude and adherence to the rules, and, after pledging tens of billions in bailout programs for five years, has expressed scant sympathy for Greece’s demand for more financial help. As de facto leader of Europe, Ms. Merkel faces a very different set of responsibilities, starting with maintaining European unity in general and holding the euro together in particular.

FRANKFURT — A week before international peace talks on Syria are to begin in Switzerland, Western leaders and intelligence officials are reacting with alarm to what they say are the rising numbers of young people leaving Europe and the United States to wage jihad against President Bashar al-Assad. The public comments, which coincided with an international donors conference on Wednesday for victims of Syria’s war, have highlighted the issue Western nations face. Concerns over the continuance of what they call Mr. Assad’s dictatorial rule must be weighed against the threat that the rebellion, which the West supports, is creating a...