There is a “huge risk” of terror attacks in the EU ahead of Christmas, European Home Affairs Commissioner Ylva Johansson warned on Tuesday, linking the threat to the ongoing war in the Middle East.
“With the war between Israel and Hamas, and the polarization it causes in our society, with the upcoming holiday season, there is a huge risk of terrorist attacks in the European Union,” she told reporters before the start of the Justice and Home Affairs Council.
Johansson’s comments follow an attack near the Eiffel Tower in Paris last weekend during which a German man was killed, and others injured, by a man who had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State group, according to a French prosecutor. “We saw it recently in Paris, unfortunately we have seen it earlier as well,” Johansson said.
In October, a French teacher was stabbed to death in a knife attack at a school in Arras which the French authorities treated as a terrorist incident. In late November Germany’s domestic spy agency also said the war between Israel and Hamas has fueled an increased risk of attacks by radicalized Islamists inside Germany.
Several European countries have seen an increase in the number of antisemitic crimes since Palestinian militant group Hamas launched an attack against Israel on October 7, killing 1,200 people and taking hundreds of hostages. That sparked a massive retaliation by Israel against Hamas in Gaza which has killed more than 15,000 Palestinians so far, according to both the Palestinian Authority and Gaza’s Hamas-run health ministry.
