Jan. 7, 2015 set the tone for Europe in 2015. Two brothers, both radical Muslims, forced their way into satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo’s headquarters. Armed with assault rifles, they killed 11 and wounded 11 more, killing a police officer on their way out. Another five were killed in terrorist attacks throughout Paris over the next few days.

This intensified fear of terrorism and mistrust of Muslims is the biggest change in Europe. That doesn’t mean there was no fear in Europe prior to these attacks. The Continent was deeply affected by the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks. But Europe had not experienced a major terrorist attack for about a decade. The one exception, an attack in France in 2012 targeting soldiers and Jews, was not aimed at the general public, nor was it as large as the Charlie Hebdo attack. By the end of 2015 though, even the Charlie Hebdo attack had been eclipsed. The November 13 Paris attacks left 130 dead and nearly 400 wounded. It was the deadliest attack on France since World War ii.

Transitioning from 10 years of almost no terrorist attacks to two attacks in one year cannot help but impact Europe.

Since November, the fear of terrorism has driven the news in Europe. Many of the biggest events of the entire year have come in the wake of the November 13 terrorist attacks. For example, France invoked Europe’s self-defense clause in responding to these attacks. This was the subject of editor in chief Gerald Flurry’s from the editor article in the February 2016 issue of the Trumpet newsmagazine. He wrote, “Most people didn’t recognize the significance of France’s decision. … It will significantly alter the history of these nations, and of Europe.” As the Telegraph put it, “France has set a precedent for using the EU as the first response to military attack in the Continent, marking a decisive shift away from nato.”

After the attack, French President François Hollande spoke personally to Europe’s leaders, asking them to do more to help France attack the Islamic State in Syria. Now Europe is getting more deeply involved in the Middle East—especially Germany. Germany is getting more and more drawn into this region. It has a mandate for close to 1,000 troops in Mali. It is also in charge of training Mali’s army and police, so Germany has a huge influence in the country. It has a reconnaissance mission and naval mission near Syria. It is stepping up its efforts to arm and train Kurds in Iraq. Over the weekend, it agreed to take part in a nato mission monitoring Turkey’s air space. This was in response to Russia, rather than the migrant crisis. Either way, Germany is getting pulled into the Middle East region.

The more subtle, and perhaps more significant, way Europe has changed is in its attitude toward Islam. As Peter Foster wrote in the Telegraph: “The Paris attacks … threaten the ‘very essence’ of the European way of life, as far-right parties seek to capitalize on the attacks, analysts have warned.”

He continued, “With Paris now enduring this second major terror bloodbath in under a year, questions are now being asked about how much longer both Europe’s open-border system and vision of a tolerant, multicultural society can survive.”

A few articles after the attack discussed the increasing suspicion that all Muslims were coming under. The New York Times had an article titled “After Paris Attacks, a Darker Mood Toward Islam Emerges in France.”

This suspicion is far from outright hostility, but far-right parties have continued the trend we’ve seen over the past five years or more: They have grown in popularity across the Continent. In France, for example, the National Front had its best ever popularity rating in December. With each terrorist attack, attitudes against all Muslims are hardening.

Joined at the hip with this rising fear of terrorism is Europe’s immigration crisis. This was already big news in 2014. That year, 280,000 migrants entered the European Union. That was a big deal. It regularly made the news and prompted a lot of EU discussions. Italy especially struggled to deal with migrants crossing from Libya.

In 2015, over 1 million migrants entered Europe—that is nearly four times as many as the previous year. This is quickly becoming Europe’s most pressing concern.

Of course, this is closely connected to the terrorism crisis. Most of these migrants are Muslim. Many are coming from Syria. One of the key leaders of the Paris attacks boasted about how easy it was for him to come and go between Syria and the EU. Just as terrorism is threatening Europe’s easy-going, multicultural mentality, so too is the immigration crisis. Trumpet columnist Brad Macdonald wrote about this trend in his article “Europe’s Old Demons Return” before the Paris terrorist attacks.

Changing Mood in Europe

This return of Europe’s old demons has been especially noticeable in Germany. There’s no denying the big changes in attitude and politics within Germany. Not only is there increasing discussion about the future of the once phenomenally popular Chancellor Angela Merkel, but there’s an increasingly violent anti-immigrant and anti-Muslim movement in Germany. Here are some headlines from articles featured in our Trumpet Weekly publication over the last few months:

These headlines are mostly from popular, mainstream news sources, such as Spiegel. All kinds of journalists see this big change within Germany. Even cold, hard statistics show us something has changed. We don’t have complete statistics for 2015, but even what we do have is dramatic. In 2014, there were six arson attacks on asylum hostels. As of the beginning of December 2015, there were 68. Police recorded 817 “criminal acts on asylum hostels” in 2015. German officials said that in October there were 1,717 crimes motivated by right-wing politics. Just one month before, the figure was at 1,484.

Even before the Paris attacks, the Associated Press was writing about a “wave of fury” sweeping across Germany. “While it’s the extremists on the far right who are grabbing most of the headlines, mainstream Germans are increasingly being drawn into inflammatory rhetoric—and at times, anti-foreigner sentiment” (emphasis added throughout).

In an article titled “What’s Happening to My Country?”, Markus Feldenkirchen wrote in Spiegel that the “mood in the country is akin to a drunken rage of the kind last seen in the beer halls of the 1920s Weimar Republic—that period of crude, uncivilized behavior that paved the way for Hitler’s rise and the most brutal decade in world history.” This change of mood in Germany is another one of the big changes we saw in Europe in 2015.

He Who Controls the Euro …

Germany’s increasing dominance of Europe via the power of the euro made further headway in 2014. Even before the Greek crisis over the summer, Spiegel wrote an article called “‘The Fourth Reich’: What Some Europeans See When They Look at Germany.” In it, they concluded: “[A]n empire is in play, at least in the economic realm. The eurozone is clearly ruled by Germany, though Berlin is not unchallenged. It does, however, have a significant say in the fates of millions of people from other countries.”

That was written in the spring, and then in the summer, the crisis in Greece flared up. At the start of the year, Greece elected the relatively and far-left Syriza party. It wanted to reject austerity, which triggered a dispute with the EU and particularly Germany. Eventually, Greece ran out of money and had to turn to Europe for a bailout. There were a lot of tough and very combative negotiations. The EU insisted that it would only loan Greece more cash under very strict conditions. So Greece held a referendum on the issue. The public voted to reject the conditions. Yet Germany somehow managed to impose them anyway. The very next day, Germany forced Greece to capitulate to the terms that the voters had just rejected.

EU Observer noted, “Monday, July 13, will go down in history as the day Greece lost its independence after 185 years of freedom, the day democracy died in the country that invented it.” Greece must now accept the following rules and conditions:

This was much firmer, tougher and more aggressive leadership and dominance of the eurozone than we had ever seen from Germany to this point. And it is still having an impact.

There were major political upheavals in Spain and Portugal in December 2015. All of these new political parties are treading more carefully, talking less about open rebellion against austerity. All these nations are much more reticent than they would otherwise be to revolt against austerity. They are more willing to stick with the bailout terms because they saw what happened to Greece. In making an example of Greece, Germany cemented its economic leadership over the eurozone. As the Financial Times wrote: “This was the real coup over the weekend: not only regime change in Greece, but also regime change in the eurozone.”

Because of what happened over the summer, these nations are much more reluctant to challenge Germany. In every crisis Europe has faced, it has been very clear who is in charge. Look at how Europe is still dealing with Russia. It was Germany who completely dictated whether sanctions on Russia would be extended. Other nations had different ideas, but it didn’t matter; Germany got its way. Germany’s way of dealing with the migrant crisis has caused a lot of resentment across Europe, but Germany has still set the tone of Europe’s policy for dealing with immigrants.

Catholic Influence

It is worth considering the changes the Catholic Church tried to push forward in 2015. It played a major role in brokering a deal between Cuba and America. In successfully brokering this deal, the church demonstrated that it can make things happen on the world stage—significantly increasing its power and prestige. After the Cuba deal, the Vatican essentially recognized the “state of Palestine”—paving the way for others to do so around the world, and deepening its diplomatic involvement in the Middle East.

In June, the pope released his most radical document yet: his Laudato Si (Be Praised) encyclical. The Guardian called it “the most astonishing and perhaps the most ambitious papal document of the past 100 years.” Essentially, it is a subtle bid for much greater Catholic control over the global economy and global politics. Here he builds on the previous pope’s (Benedict xvi) radical call for a “world political authority” to ensure peace and security and to put an end to starvation by environmental abuse. “Enforceable international agreements are urgently needed” as well as talks about “global regulatory norms.” Essentially, it’s a call for Catholic political authority over the global economy.

The pope followed this up with his much publicized visit to America. It attracted huge press attention, and politicians from both parties fawned over him. Francis set himself up well to push for a greater Catholic role in the economy within America.

If there is one main thing to focus on this year in Europe, it is the rise of the biblically prophesied dictator over the European Union. One of the first headlines Herbert W. Armstrong used on the front page of his Plain Truth magazine was “Is a World Dictator About to Appear?” It pointed to a strong leader in Europe who was to come on the scene. The increase in anxiety toward Islam and fear of terrorism is creating big political unrest in Europe. There is a lot of uncertainty, especially in Germany. Political turmoil will also be driven by the euro crisis. All this will ultimately lead people to desire not only a strong Germany, but a strong leader ruling Germany and the whole eurozone. That is the direction in which Europe is traveling.