- 2 giorni fa
Medio Oriente, escalation: è una guerra europea? Eurodeputati si scontrano a The Ring
In questa nuova edizione di The Ring, in onda dal Parlamento europeo a Bruxelles, gli eurodeputati Riho Terras (PPE) e Özlem Demirel (The Left) discutono del ruolo dell’Europa nella guerra in corso in Medio Oriente.
ALTRE INFORMAZIONI : http://it.euronews.com/2026/03/26/medio-oriente-escalation-e-una-guerra-europea-eurodeputati-si-scontrano-a-the-ring
Abbonati, euronews è disponibile in 12 lingue.
In questa nuova edizione di The Ring, in onda dal Parlamento europeo a Bruxelles, gli eurodeputati Riho Terras (PPE) e Özlem Demirel (The Left) discutono del ruolo dell’Europa nella guerra in corso in Medio Oriente.
ALTRE INFORMAZIONI : http://it.euronews.com/2026/03/26/medio-oriente-escalation-e-una-guerra-europea-eurodeputati-si-scontrano-a-the-ring
Abbonati, euronews è disponibile in 12 lingue.
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00:07Hello there and welcome to The Ring, Euronews' weekly debating show broadcasting from the
00:13European Parliament here in Brussels. On The Ring, elected members of the European Parliament
00:19go one to one on some of the biggest challenges facing the European Union today. With fire
00:26and fury all across the Middle East, today we're asking if the European Union should use its
00:32leverage to try to encourage President Donald Trump to stop what they say is not Europe's
00:38war. Luis Alberto has more. With the US-Israeli war in Iran now entering its third week, Europe
00:47finds itself navigating an increasingly volatile geopolitical landscape. Last week, EU leaders
00:54gathered in Brussels to discuss the situation in the Middle East, stressing the need for
00:58de-escalation, the protection of civilians and restraint in targeting critical infrastructure.
01:06Leaders also underline the need to keep the vital Strait of Hormuz shipping lane open to
01:11mitigate energy supply disruptions as much as possible. Following last week's summit,
01:15more and more EU leaders are following an approach rooted in modularism and de-escalation. Chancellor
01:22Merz, who initially showed understanding for the US and Israel's strikes, is now distancing
01:27himself from the Trump administration's approach, as are many others. With European leaders
01:33choosing to stay largely on the sidelines of the conflict for now, what role should Europe
01:38take? And can it safeguard its economic interests at a time when consumers are already under pressure
01:43from high energy costs? The questions that we have for our contenders, let's meet them.
01:53Özlem Demirel, a German MEP from the Left Group. She's a member of the Committees on Foreign Affairs and
01:59Security and Defense, a consistent critic of militarization and EU defense policy. She argues that increased
02:06arms spending fuels conflict rather than resolving it. In the context of the war in Iran, she said,
02:12bombs fall, the stock markets rise, people die. Israel and the United States don't care about the people of Iran.
02:20Ryo Terras, an Estonian army general and MEP from the Central-Right European People's Party. He is the
02:27vice president of the Security and Defense Committee at the European Parliament. A cheerleader for defense
02:33spending, he has stated, we have talked about defense and strategic autonomy for years, yet decisions stall,
02:39investments and innovation lag. Before blaming others, Kayakalas and other EU leaders should ask
02:46themselves what they have done to change this.
02:50Özlem Demirel and Ryo Terras, welcome to The Ring. As regular viewers will know, the objective here on The Ring
02:59is to show
02:59people back home how debates here in the European Parliament actually function and how you sometimes and sometimes
03:06not reach compromises. Are you ready? Yes. So first question, Ryo Terras, do you support Trump and Israel's war in
03:13Iran?
03:13I think Ayatollah regime has violated human rights in Iran for 47 years and it needed to be done something
03:24and all the efforts of
03:26diplomacy did not work. But I am not sure the way it was launched today was the right way. I
03:33think launching a military
03:34operation you need to know what the desired political end state is and I cannot see the desired political
03:41end state today. I understand it could be the regime change but you are not able to change the regime
03:47with only
03:48poorly, poorly military means but the military means but the military means are necessary to force your ideas and I
03:56think it should
03:58have been discussed with the allies beforehand also. These are the, that's why I don't see the current moment the
04:07end state.
04:08What about yourself, Özlem? I'm rejecting this war totally and I want to say that we know from the history
04:15that military means and
04:17military interventions and force never brought democracy to this region. So I want this war to stop. And what would
04:24you have done
04:25then in that case to get rid of the regime? Look, my family has Kurdish roots. So it's not like
04:34this that I'm supporting this
04:35regime in any way. I don't do it. And this regime is a brutal regime, oppressing his own people. And
04:43this regime has to gun. But the gun of the
04:47this regime never could be an intervention from foreign forces. So we have to stop this war and to support
04:55the people of Iran to get a better future. And of course the regime is still there. Mashtaba Khamenei is
05:02now the new supreme
05:03leader. And of course the goal of Donald Trump in principle was to get rid of the regime. That goal
05:09has not been reached. Do you think President Trump has a
05:12plan here, Rio Taras? Well, I just said that I don't see the desired end state defined politically, but I
05:18think the plan is to change
05:20the regime. And if you have less regime people, if you kill them as many as possible, then there is
05:26a weak and weakens the regime. If you force the
05:32national guard units of Iraqi guards to disappear, then it gives the
05:39possibility to the people. I think the mistake has been made that the attack did not take place
05:45before very large portion of the opposition were killed and executed recently before the war. And the people are not
05:57there. But on the response to how we can do it without military means,
06:01I don't think we will be able to discuss with Adolf Hitler, the regime change or political election of somebody
06:09would not have
06:10help and did not work. It is history shows that in certain areas, the military means are necessary. And nobody
06:18listens to somebody who does
06:21not have military means. Look at Europe. Europe is not at the table, not in Ukraine. And just before we
06:27go into Europe not being on the table, let's get
06:28Oslem to respond to what you heard. Yes. Look, I'm from Germany and I don't like it when people are
06:34comparing now our wars with the war of Adolf Hitler. Adolf
06:38Hitler attacked a lot of other countries. He started wars. This is not the case we have now by Iran.
06:44Iran didn't attack. Iran didn't attack
06:47anybody. And to be honest, this war from Israel and US is not about democracy. It's not about the people.
06:54It's not about autocracy. We know that this
06:57countries also are working together with a lot of autocrats in this region, also religious reactionary systems and regimes. So
07:06this
07:06is not the case. This is about for Israel to get a bigger Israel. It is about U.S. control,
07:14important resources, important
07:17trade routes. And on Israel, in fact. Let's talk about the real reasons of this war and we have to
07:22reject it because this war
07:24has a lot of impacts of the people, firstly in Iran, who are dying, but also all over the world.
07:30So the Iranian regime did not have an influence on the people. You know from history, you are a general,
07:35former general. You have been in Afghanistan.
07:37But the history says that Iran has spread terrorism around itself. It has financed the terrorism, financed Hezbollah, financed Hamas,
07:45which caused the people to die in this area.
07:49So Iran is launching war against people. You have been a former general in Afghanistan, right?
07:54How was the situation in Afghanistan after 20 years of war in Afghanistan? You said you wanted to
08:01free the women in Afghanistan. The situation of the women in Afghanistan after the war, you also were part of.
08:08They were free as we were there. They were free as we were there. The people I have seen
08:15women working on the computers in Afghanistan. What is the result of the war?
08:20The strategic end state was not defined. I think that is the same problem today.
08:24But there is that issue of the collateral damage of Trump's war that, as we heard, Europe does not support.
08:29We've heard the Europeans say this is not our war. But yet Europe is sending millions to support Lebanon,
08:34whereas they have no say here, Oslem, in this war.
08:36To be honest, it's not acceptable. Europe was also silent when Israel was a war criminal and had a
08:46genocide on the Palestinian people. And my country, Germany, for example, talked about the cancer of
08:53Germany, who was part of your party family, talked about the dirty work Israel is doing for us. And I
09:01want
09:01to ask, what is it about? And I want to ask, why is the European Union then so vocal when
09:07it comes to
09:07Ukraine's war, but not when it comes to this? Because Ukraine is in Europe. And that is where
09:14we have the biggest concern and the biggest threat. And I think this war in Iran takes the focus away
09:21from children dying today in Ukraine every day. But there's over one million displaced,
09:27internally displaced in Lebanon. The European Union is sending cash flows there for this humanitarian
09:31crisis. I understand that. But again, why is Europe not taken seriously? Because it does not have the
09:38military might to talk, to be taken seriously. And I think diplomacy has only its ways if it's
09:47supported by the strength, economical strength and military strength. Back to the war in Iran.
09:52European leaders said it's not their war, but it's, of course, impacting you and me, every one of us.
09:56What would you say to that? It's not the war of the European Union. And they are honest,
10:01they have to stop that the military bases in Europe can be used. Spain has shown us how it could
10:08work. And they have to stop their arm exports to Israel and to US. And it's interesting you
10:15mentioned Spain, because of course, Spain, or the Spanish government of Pedro Sanchez did speak out
10:19against this war. And Donald Trump, Rio Terras responded by saying, we're going to cut off trade with
10:25Spain. Do you think that's why other EU countries are a little bit hesitant to speak out?
10:29No, I don't think so. But I think Spain is violating the unity of European Union by
10:34not paying its own bill on the defense, and now trying to split the unity of European Union. I
10:41understand that Trump only takes us seriously if we act together. And he wants us to take by piece of
10:49peace. And that is exactly what Sanchez has achieved by acting alone.
10:55Okay, we're getting just warmed up here, but it's time to take a very short break.
11:03Because now it's time for our viewers to get a real flavor of the Parliament Chamber, where MEPs
11:08ask direct questions to each other. And sometimes, as you can see, it does get heated. Ladies first,
11:14of them. Okay, I want to hear from your side. What is your solution for this war? Does the European
11:21Union not have any instruments to stop this war? Or are you against stopping this war?
11:27If you mean the war in Iran, then I don't think Europe has today the instruments,
11:32because we are not strong enough to sit at the table. We can try to use our diplomatic means,
11:38but nobody listens to us. That means that we need to work on our own capabilities,
11:46on our own strengths. And even the economy is not anymore the strengths of Europe, because we are
11:53not unified enough. Now, your opportunity to ask a question now to Aslem. We have seen
12:02wars emerge around us. Europe has not launched any wars. Europe has not in the last, like 70 years,
12:09not been part to a war itself. But we see others attacking European countries around us. Do you think
12:16that Europe can solve these problems diplomatically? Or do we need military means to back up our diplomatic
12:24efforts? And if not, what is the other way? To be honest, yes, the European Union as the European
12:31Union didn't launch wars. But European member states were also in the past a part of wars,
12:39like we saw in Afghanistan, like we saw in Iraq, like we saw in Libya. It was not,
12:45UK has not anymore European Union, but it was also European countries. So it's not true that the European
12:52Union in the past was just standing for diplomacy and against wars in this world. So if we want to
12:58answer the times of wars, we have to go back and to stop about talking just about militarization.
13:05Do you know the definition of a dialogue? Yes, sure. Yeah, that means that it needs two parts
13:10to what who want to discuss, to talk to each other. If one side wants to talk and the other
13:15one is not,
13:16and I have been experiencing myself trying to reach out to the Russian chief of defense,
13:21as I was chief of defense. And the response was, why? Nobody wants to talk to us. And not the
13:27dictator Putin, not Chairman Xi, they don't care. And as long as we are weak, we are not at the
13:35table.
13:35And the dialogue needs two sides. And if Russia understands only military means,
13:42and they did not use diplomacy against Ukraine. Maybe a reaction on them to that.
13:45I don't know what you mean with weak. European Union is one of the huge or one of the biggest
13:51economic powers of the world. And also the European member states has a lot of military
13:57instruments, and we are spending a lot of money for military needs. So it's like this. The facts are on
14:04the table. So don't tell just we are like this or we are like this. What is happening by now
14:09is that the
14:10European Union also decided, like the US, like China, like other big powers in this world,
14:16that they want to defend its own interests. And this means resources of the world, trade routes
14:22of the world by military means. And what this means is that people are dying, that the working class all
14:28over the world is paying the bill for it. And this is not acceptable. This is why I'm rejecting this
14:34military means. And I'm saying we have to find another way to protect lives, to protect our earth.
14:41There are certain things we cannot do yet that still responds to what we can or cannot do.
14:46So we need to invest commonly together to a drone defense, because we have seen a new weapon
14:55developing a disruptive technology, which has been used in Ukraine and kills people. We need,
15:00for example, to invest in this kind of technologies in order to make sure that our people are defended
15:07and they are not dying. Let me say clearly, it's not a solution for nobody to prolong wars. And it's
15:15also
15:15like this, that not just Putin said, I don't want to negotiate. It was also like this, that the Western
15:20countries, long, long time said, we had no possibilities to negotiate. We don't want to
15:25negotiate. And this was prolonging this war. And the result of this war is not good for the Ukrainian
15:33people. So let's say, let me say this. You are from the EPP and you are standing for a conservative
15:40politics. You are in the last weeks, your group has really weakened the right of asylum
15:47in European Union systems. And it's like this, that the war in Iran also has the result that people
15:54have to flee, that they become refugees and maybe they want to come here. What is your answer? Why are
16:01you supporting wars or not rejecting wars, not doing everything to stop wars and on the other side,
16:06working against people who are affected by this wars and become refugees? What is your answer?
16:11May I start with saying EPP is not launching wars, is not causing wars. And the only thing EPP stands
16:18for
16:19is to defend people against the wars which are around us. Be it an Iran regime which has been killing,
16:28torturing people 47 years. Or be it Russia who has never listened to anybody who launched wars
16:35since 2008, whose political aims are, who wants to achieve its political aims by military means.
16:44And just on the potential refugee. Yeah, I'll come back to that. And so that is not what we want.
16:50And we
16:50want European people live safely in Europe. But we are ready to take refugees, but we don't want to have
16:59illegal refugees. We don't want to have economic refugees. We want to know who is living in Europe
17:07and who is not. And that's what we stand for. But nowadays, we have deportations to Syria,
17:13for example, where the war is. And that is, of course, we have deportations to Iran. We have
17:18deportations to Afghanistan. They are not deportations because it's about people who are illegally in Europe.
17:23And that is a debate for another day. But we have heard the views from our MEPs. And now I
17:28would
17:28like to bring in another argument. It is the voice of the U.S. ambassador to the European Union. That
17:37is Andrew Puzder. He spoke to me earlier this week on Europe Today, Euronews' morning show. And he
17:43encouraged members of the European Parliament here to ratify the Turnberry EU-U.S. trade deal,
17:48saying that it would be an economic malpractice not to pass this deal, that the U.S. is not an
17:54obstacle. Puzder also described it as a great deal for the United States and the European Union. So
17:59I'm curious to hear your thoughts on what the Ambassador Puzder said about this deal, the fact
18:04that the European Parliament should push ahead and ratify it. European Parliament should defend
18:09the European people's interest. And therefore, the Commission has worked out the deal. It is
18:15not the ideal deal. But we have to find the minimum common denominator with the U.S. and find the
18:24ways. We have to deal with the U.S. We have to. And the current administration is not for Europe.
18:30The
18:30interest is not being European. They defend their people. So our task is to defend our people. And
18:36trade with the U.S. is needed, necessary and good for our businesses and people. Because just remember,
18:41that deal tripled tariffs on European goods while cutting duties on U.S. and industrial goods down
18:47to zero. And of course, it was harshly criticized for months as too favorable to the Trump administration.
18:52What is your view here on what Andrew Puzder said to us earlier this week?
18:55I think we should have a clearer talk to the U.S. And if it's about defending the interests of
19:00the European
19:01people, we should have a clear politic that rejected what Donald Trump is by now doing. It should reject the
19:08war in Iran. Clearly, it should reject the politics of America, who is saying America first and
19:14dealing with a lot of wars. It's not just Iran. It's also Venezuela. It's also Cuba. It's also other
19:20countries who are now affected badly. And so we should have an own politics, which is really
19:26taking in mind what the people of Europe need. And the people of Europe needs especially social
19:32security systems. They need a cap for energy prices. They need affordable housing and stuff
19:37like this. And the European Union is not doing anything or not enough in this part.
19:42And we'll come back to that point on consumers in just one minute. But now it is time to take
19:47a very
19:47short break here on The Ring. But stay with us because we'll be back very soon with some more
19:51political punch from the European Parliament.
20:01Welcome back to The Ring, Euronews' weekly debate show here in the European Parliament in Brussels.
20:07For this edition, I'm joined by MEPs Rio Terras and Oslim de Mirol. And the idea here is to bring
20:13the European Parliament debates to your very sofa. This week, we're focusing on how the European Union
20:19and its leaders are reacting to the ongoing war in Iran, a war that's directly impacting me and you,
20:25whether you're based in Kenya, Kerala or Kerry. Now, we wanted to hear from you. So we actually took
20:30to the streets of Brussels to hear how this war is affecting your daily life.
20:35It has affected a lot of travel. I know that for sure. An economy in Greece, we have a lot
20:40of
20:41cancellations and it has impacted tourism as well. So there's definitely an economic impact in our country.
20:47I'm sure that everyone in the European Union will feel the impact. Everything, everything, food,
20:53services, gas for sure. Probably also things like heating.
21:00I mean, it's energy. Everyone uses it. Everyone needs it. And I find it pretty crazy that the decision
21:09of two countries to go to war against Iran has such an impact on pretty much everyone.
21:15I'm not anxious, but definitely will hit. But I already implement some energy saving measures,
21:22so I hope this won't hit me hard. So Rio Terras there, impacting everyone. Your reaction?
21:29Absolutely. Absolutely. And that only shows that Europe needs to become more independent
21:34from the energy sources. And I think we should go back to the nuclear energy, which gives us the
21:40autonomy if we need it. Would you agree with that? No, I don't think that the nuclear energy is an
21:47energy system for the future. But what we have to do is to build up the renewable energy systems. And
21:54European Union has slept long, long time and forget to do this. And as we all know, nuclear takes years,
22:01right? It takes years. Well, there's the small modular reactors, but they're also just being tested out.
22:05But just back to measures for Europeans. Now, today, we've seen Pedro Sánchez, Spanish prime minister,
22:12propose a 5 billion euro package to help consumers. Is that a good idea, Rio Terras?
22:17To help in the difficult situation is a good idea. If it's not the populism before the elections,
22:24I think we need to make an economy stronger. And the economy depends on the energy, for example.
22:31So we need really to take very various packages. And I don't think that the renewable energy is
22:39something bad. But as we saw this winter in Estonia, the renewable energy does not help us in the
22:46situation where there is no wind and no sun and no batteries to restore it. So we need sources which
22:56give
22:56energy on that moment. So we need to have a diversified package of energy and focus on that to make
23:03European
23:04economy more competitive, especially in the times of war. Just one sentence about the social impacts and
23:11energy impacts of the of this war. We had it also by the war in Ukraine. We had it in
23:17the Corona pandemic.
23:18We had a situation that really some companies are earning a lot of money. And this is also by now
23:25the fact that oil companies are having real big profits by now because they are using this crisis
23:32every time. And the people are in a real bad situation. They have to decide if they buy food or
23:38if they
23:38fill their tank for the car to go to the work. So this is not acceptable. So I think it's
23:44not just a good
23:44idea to have packages to protect our people. It's necessary that we do it. And it's necessary
23:50that we cut the extra benefits, the extra profits from the companies. They have a lot of
23:57should should EU leaders be gathering and discussing this? You are not able to
24:02distribute the wealth if there's no wealth. So market economy says you can only distribute
24:08something which exists and to have a profit is nothing bad and evil. The profits and good
24:14tax profits are exactly what brings us ahead and gives our economy a stronger stand and the
24:22country's strongest situation. And I think the European Union need to go gather together and find
24:27the solution for our at first of all for our competitiveness in our current world. But the big
24:33companies has a lot of money and they are richer than they had been ever before. We have more money
24:38in
24:39than the European Union we had before. This is fact. What we have is that the middle stand, middle
24:44classes and the poor people are not anymore able to finance their life. And this is a problem. So we
24:50have
24:50to talk about the extra rich part of this region. We have a lot of millionaires, billionaires earning more
24:58money in this crisis. This is not acceptable. I'm sorry. I have lived in communism where the distribution of the
25:04wealth
25:04was done without having rich and poor. And that was evil. That was the worst time of my life. I
25:11don't
25:11want to come back. Look, you can you can just come with buzzwords like communism, stuff like this.
25:16I have lived there. You have not. The people of Europe, they are realizing that that what we are living
25:23in
25:24now is no perspective for them. It is rising. It is rising. And we need answers for the people. And
25:31you can't you can't just put the real demands of the people away and just talking about communism.
25:38I'm not talking about communism. I'm talking about security for the people of Europe. So that's the
25:43views from our MAPs. We would love to hear as well your view here. Join our debate. The ring at
25:49your
25:49news.com. That is our email address. So please reach out. But it is now time to move on to
25:54our
25:54fifth and final range. Are you ready? So now it is time for something a little bit different. I'm
26:03going to be asking our MAPs a set of questions. And you only have the opportunity to answer with yes
26:10or no. So was it a good idea to kill the Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei? Yes or no?
26:17I don't like him, but I don't think that it's illegal and it shouldn't be.
26:22Was it a good idea? Yes or no? Yes. Is the US still a friend to the European Union? Yes
26:28or no?
26:28Yes. The US people? Yes. Trump? No. Should the EU be more involved in this war? Yes or no?
26:35Clearly no. Yes. And should European countries increase defense spending? Yes or no? Yes.
26:42No. Should Europe focus on renewable energy? Yes or no? Yes. And manage a mix?
26:49Manage a mix. And should NATO be involved if the conflict expands? Yes or no? No.
26:56No. No, I'm against NATO also. And just a question on European governments. Should European governments
27:01be subsidizing energy costs today now to protect consumers? Yes or no? Yes.
27:05Yes. And is Iran a direct threat to European security? No. Yes, and it has always been.
27:13Okay. And have you agreed on anything that you've heard here?
27:19And what about you? Have you agreed? I agree that the renewable energy is a part of the energy mix.
27:25Great. Well, I think we've given our viewers a perfect flavor of how you actually interact
27:29right here in the parliament. So thank you so much to you both for being with us here. That
27:33does bring this edition of The Ring to an end. As I said, the ring at euronews.com. That is
27:38our email
27:38address. Please reach out. Thank you so much again. Take care and see you soon on Euronews.
27:42We'll see you soon on Euronews.
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