Eifel tower the most well known landmark of Paris. Built in 1887-1889

Source: BBC

By Jonathan Marcus; Diplomatic correspondent

We are accustomed to thinking about policy in binary terms – domestic politics on the one hand, foreign affairs on the other.

But as the tragic events in Brussels demonstrate once again, home and away are not so easily separated.

Indeed, in a fundamental sense, the problems of a fragmenting Middle East are fast-becoming Europe’s problems too.

Whether it be terrorism, the tide of migration, Libya’s future, Iran’s nuclear policies, or the problematic relationship with Turkey, the wider Middle East is now intruding into the European consciousness on a day-to-day basis.

In some ways, this is a reversion to a long-standing historical norm.

Think back to the colonial era, when France, Italy and Great Britain controlled huge swathes of territory in the Middle East.

The collapse of the Ottoman Empire in the wake of the World War One prompted an expansion of the French and British government’s responsibilities in the region, with mandates in Syria and Palestine.

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Indeed, the map of the Middle East so much under threat today was largely set by these same European powers after the Great War.

In the past, terrorism too has battered on Europe’s doors.

The struggle for Algerian independence in the late-1950s brought terror attacks against French targets.

And a generation later, in the 1990s, Algerian extremists again attacked France, both to highlight their own campaign and to exact revenge against what was seen as the former colonial oppressor.

Shrinking world

But what is happening today seems fundamentally different.

In part, the nature of the Middle East’s crisis is more severe.

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