What happened to Britain? This is the question that is being asked in different languages. The European continent is watching the events in London under great tension. What does Prime Minister Boris Johnson do? What is Brexit? For more than three years Britain has been engaged in domestic political battles over its withdrawal from the Union. Throughout this time, viewers in Paris, Rome, Berlin and elsewhere across Europe wondered how this once-competitive country, of great value and unanimous political consensus, is deadlocked and has not found a suitable way to remove itself from Europe.
"It was probably a deal that was already done," writes Bernard Gita, a newly elected member of the European Parliament. "No doubt it's time to tell you this, but because I simply don't want to believe it, I want to say: Don't leave us." “In war and peace, we shared one destiny two thousand years ago, and today you want to cut your roots and move away from us and your European identity, at a stage when our unity and our common institutions have finally reached a point where we all as Europeans - you and you - can live without He killed each other. ”
In a front-page editorial this week, entitled "Boris Threat," the conservative daily Le Figaro launched an attack on British Prime Minister Boris Johnson. "In this venerable parliamentary democracy, whose unwritten constitution is woven from a complex fabric of agreements and fair play," the newspaper wrote, "pursuing the prime minister's bad ethics creates a dangerous precedent and exposes the regime's weaknesses." By enforcing a British exit from the EU, the paper explains that the UK would sever most of its ties with the EU and its institutions, Johnson was laying the groundwork for a future election campaign against the elites and the established order. "Haven't we seen anything like this before?" Asks Le Figaro.
Great fear
When the Brexit referendum was held in 2016, Europe was shocked and feared that Brexit would destroy Europe. If any country could leave, what prevented others who were frustrated with EU rules and regulations from simply moving away, too? Then, in the following years, especially after the failures of former British Prime Minister Theresa May, the Union's attitude toward Britain's departure from fear of itself shifted to concern for Britain. France's foreign affairs commentator Pierre Haskey says the vote to leave Britain "has caused a great fear for Europe," adding that "we have turned from that to pity for the British."
When the "yellow jackets" movement emerged in France last fall, it exposed a gap between the countryside and urbanism, and growing resentment. French President Emmanuel Macron has managed, at least for now, to deal with this by launching a national debate rather than a risky referendum on such issues. Elsewhere, like Italy, far-right parties that once called for the euro to loosen their rhetoric and slogans to soothe the EU from within have feared a backlash from an audience that has seen chaos in Britain from afar. In Greece, which has already faced a real threat of exit from the euro, the political class has been frustrated by the illusion of exit advocates in the UK that leaving the EU will be easy.
Johnson's rise to power marks a turning point in how Europe sees the UK. For a while, Europe was in tune with Johnson, who was secretary of state in the early period of Theresa May; or turned a blind eye to his ambition to reach the summit. This ambition was embodied in late August, when Johnson, a prime minister, met Macron and put his foot on the coffee table in front of him, in an indifferent but intentional way to pass a message to the French.
Impatience
Johnson put his foot on the table after Macron, at least symbolically, lowered it to make it clear that Europe was impatient and Britain would not give more concessions, and that European officials believed it was up to Johnson to make concrete proposals on how Britain would exit the EU. Macron believes that Brexit will weaken the UK, leading to "historic caving" with other rival powers - the United States, China and Europe.
The divided world view between Europe and Britain that supports Brexit is summed up by tweets from the Daily Telegraph and the Financial Times about the Macron-Johnson meeting. The Telegraph, a pro-Brexit newspaper that has long been publishing a weekly column for Johnson, said "a big boost to Boris Johnson's position, as Emmanuel Macron says the withdrawal agreement can be amended," while the Financial Times, Europe's most pro-European newspaper, wrote In Macron, "Macron dispels Johnson's hope of a Brexit deal."
The pragmatists in Europe have been preparing to leave Britain for years. The European Commission is drawing up plans to exit London from the EU without a deal, including allocating funds, possibly to areas that could be affected. Companies in northern France are preparing to pull out of Britain and believe they will affect the fishing, tourism and transport sectors. Calais port on the English Channel made improvements to allow traffic flow.
Clown State
But when Johnson suspended the work of parliament, Europe, which had lived in the past century under pending legislative bodies, authoritarian and bloody regimes, realized it was time to stop laughing. This week, in Germany, Deutsche Welle explained why it was impossible to suspend parliament in Germany today, which has been impossible since the Weimar Republic. The satirical weekly, Lucanard Onshene, called Johnson a "permanent state joker," but its front-page editorial was even more ironic. "This resounding approach ... adversely affects democracy," she wrote.
Political turmoil in Italy
The echoes of Brexit were also present in the background of the recent political turmoil in Italy. Italy's chaotic parliamentary system gives way to the formation of weak coalition governments, but the Italians thought they would never live to see the day when a strange political crisis emerged, no better than in London. This week, when Britain was looking for new elections, Italy was finalizing a new government in which former rivals cooperated to prevent the rise of the far-right League, led by Matteo Salvini. The latter began the government crisis last month and did not get the new elections he wanted. The alliance that prevented it was formed with the sole purpose of saving the country.
Discontent in political circles
London's intransigence over the terms of its exit brought much discontent in the political circles. "By this time, it's like trying to gather focus to understand what is going on," wrote a French analyst and consultant at the London-based International Institute for Strategic Studies, François Hesbourg. "The European supports the idea of living with this unfortunate circus for more than one minute."
• When the Brexit referendum was held in 2016, Europe was shocked and feared that Brexit would destroy Europe.