Once upon a time, Belgium was famous for its chocolate, beer, and surreal bureaucracy.
Today, it’s better known for terror cells, riots in Brussels, and politicians who apologize for being born European.
Welcome to 2025 — where a proud Western democracy has quietly morphed into the EU’s first semi-official Islamic experiment.

From Waffles to Wahhabism

Belgium was supposed to be boring — that was its charm.
A country so neutral it could make Switzerland look passionate.
But boredom, it turns out, is fertile ground for fanaticism.
While the Belgians perfected beer and fries, their politicians perfected denial.
And while they were busy debating recycling laws, Molenbeek was becoming the caliphate’s European headquarters — one kebab shop at a time.

The result?
A country where the call to prayer competes with church bells,
where Christmas markets are renamed “Winter Fairs,”
and where “integration” means pretending that nothing is happening — until it explodes.

How Beer Became a Burqa

Once Belgium was proud of Stella Artois. Today it is proud of Stella Abdallah, a high school student in Molenbeek who received an award for “cultural diversity.”
Brussels, the capital of the European Union, has become the capital of irony: a place where you will find NATO offices and Palestinian flags in the same square, at “Justice for Gaza” demonstrations taking place in front of the immigration ministry that is trying to send someone back to Syria — but doesn’t dare, because it might “hurt feelings.”

The truth is, this is not a sudden outbreak. It is a process of 30 years of cultural blindness, in which Europe tried to prove to the world that it was “too enlightened” to protect itself. When the first immigrants arrived — they wanted work, opportunity, a future.

But when the state gave them everything except identity, a void was created. And this void was filled by an ideology that knew how to exploit collective guilt, an overly soft legal system, and a media that is afraid to speak the truth out loud.

The Politics of Cowardice

Belgium’s political elite are masters of one thing: self-delusion.
They preach tolerance as if it were a religion, and submission as if it were virtue.
The left calls it “multiculturalism,”
the right calls it “madness,”
and the average citizen calls the police — if they still dare.

In a country where politicians can’t form a government for over a year,
is it any wonder that someone else decided to govern instead?
Only this time, it’s not the EU — it’s the Imams.

Brussels: Capital of Europe or Capital of Surrender?

Brussels hosts both NATO and the EU — symbols of Western unity and strength.
Ironically, it’s also home to neighborhoods where Sharia patrols dictate dress codes
and police hesitate to enter after dark.
Talk about contrast: diplomats negotiate “peace in the Middle East,”
while the Middle East has already moved in down the street.

The bureaucrats drink overpriced lattes and talk about “diversity,”
unaware that diversity has become the polite word for slow-motion disintegration.
The dream of a united Europe has turned into a multicultural sleepwalk —
and Belgium is the nightmare they refuse to wake up from.

Molenbeek – Gaza’s twin city

You can’t talk about Belgium without mentioning Molenbeek, the suburb Which has become an international code name for a hotbed of radicalization.
Every major attack in Europe in the last decade — you can find small traces of it starting on the sidewalk there.
And every time a headline exploded, the Belgian government would issue a statement: “We will fight extremism” — and then surrender after two days, when it was accused of Islamophobia.

In Molenbeek, you can now find more mosques than cafes.
It’s not that there’s a problem with mosques — there’s a problem when some don’t register with the authorities, don’t pay taxes, and instead of a Friday sermon on “brotherhood,” a lecture is given on “how to convert Europe.”

Meanwhile, on the streets nearby, Belgian hipsters are still taking selfies with beer and calling it “coexistence.”
And that’s perhaps the most Belgian thing there is: insisting on living in peace with those who have already decided they don’t want peace with you.

The Silent Exodus

Belgium’s Jewish community — once vibrant, cultured, and deeply rooted —
is quietly packing its bags.
After synagogue attacks, knife assaults, and endless excuses from the media,
many have realized that “Never Again” in Europe now comes with an expiration date.
They’re leaving for Israel, America, anywhere that still believes in security over slogans.
Because in Belgium, defending yourself is already considered an act of provocation.

The Media’s Great Escape

Every time a terror attack occurs, the Belgian media performs a familiar ritual:
first, they mourn; then, they blame society; and finally, they forget.
They talk about “youths,” “disenfranchised communities,” and “complex motivations.”
But somehow, they never talk about ideology — or Islamism — or accountability.
Because that would require courage,
and courage, much like national identity, is in short supply in Western Europe.

Europe’s Canary in the Coal Mine

Belgium is no longer an isolated case.
It’s a warning.
The first domino in a Europe that has mistaken moral relativism for compassion.
When you erase your history, shame your faith, and demonize your patriots,
you leave a vacuum —
and history shows that vacuums don’t stay empty for long.

What began as tolerance has become timidity,
and what began as immigration has become infiltration.
The world’s softest nation is now a laboratory for the West’s biggest delusion:
that you can coexist with those who despise coexistence.

 

The Chocolate’s Still Sweet — the Future Isn’t

Yes, Belgium still makes great chocolate.
But it’s also producing something much darker:
a model of how a Western country can lose its soul without firing a single shot.

The streets are clean, the waffles are perfect —
and the freedom that built them is quietly melting away,
like chocolate left too long in the sun.

The New European

In 2025, Belgium represents the fatigue of the West.
Tired of defending values, tired of being “the bad guys,” tired of having to say something normal without risking a media lynching.
The radical Muslim world does not need to conquer countries — it simply sits and waits for the West to tire of itself.

And the West is indeed tired.

Belgium has only gotten ahead of the rest: a country that has confused religious freedom with ideological surrender, between equality and identity erasure, and between tolerance and cowardice.

What Israel can learn

In our country, every discussion about national identity ends in shouting.
But at least — there is a discussion.

We have not yet forgotten why the state was founded, and what happens when we stop fighting for the values ​​that sustain it.

Belgium is a reminder to us:

A country that does not defend itself — will not survive.

A culture that is afraid to defend its borders — will disappear.

And Europe? It can keep talking about “coexistence” — while the other side talks about “occupation from within.”

Belgian Satire

So how did the Western world lose a European country to Sharia law?
Not by war.
Not by occupation.
Simply — through ballots, bureaucratic regulations, soft-spoken journalists who are careful to “do no harm.”

The West was not defeated by fire. It was defeated by kindness.
And when you educate an entire generation to be afraid to speak the truth — don’t be surprised if the truth comes in the form of a man with a black flag.

Meanwhile, in Brussels, the capital that still serves beer — a local orders an espresso, looks around, and whispers to himself with classic Belgian cynicism:
“At least Sharia hasn’t raised the price of chocolate. Yet.”

Where did this Islamist treason come from and how is the Western world losing a European country to Sharia law?

October 2025
Imagine: a small country in the heart of Europe — the silhouette of a palace, a brightly lit market square, an avenue of luxury stores — and on the other hand, news that repeats itself: arrests of young people in Antwerp, suspicions of planning an attack using drones, public discussions about the “Sharia” court that now seems less like a chilling end-of-era headline and more like an everyday problem. What happened to Belgium? Is it really “losing” its mind? Is the Western world watching institutional collapse in a slow sleepwalking cycle? And ultimately — what do we, Israelis, have to learn from this story?

The collapse of authority — not in one day, but in a long process

Belgium is an example of the complex failure of a European welfare state: a country that has all the tools — a developed legal system, police, intelligence services — and yet finds itself fighting the shadows of Islamist violence and the ideas of a “parallel law.” This did not start yesterday; the mention of districts like Molenbeek in the capital Brussels as examples of concentrations of radicalization has not disappeared since 2015, and the proliferation of cases and investigations has shown that this is an ongoing problem.

The atmosphere has been heating up recently: in October 2025, authorities in Antwerp arrested three suspects on suspicion of planning an attack, including an attempt to use a drone to carry an explosive charge — a painful reminder that threats are being updated and realized. Authorities are talking about an increase in cases related to Islamism in 2025.

What is visible is not just isolated waves of terror, but a process of establishing legal-social “islands” within the country: local institutions, schools, charities and even unofficial legal institutions that try to implement religious regulations instead of civil law. This is not a recurring theme only in the headlines — there have been – and have been seen in the past – attempts to open courts according to Sharia, for example early reports of such activity in Antwerp.

How did this happen? Four components that built the problem

A) Rapid immigration without effective absorption

After the 1960s and 1970s, Belgium received many immigrants from North African countries and Turkey. This immigration policy was not always accompanied by a courageous absorption policy: language, the labor market, the education system — all of these sometimes became “barriers” instead of bridges. A community that does not feel part of the state tends to seek an alternative identity — and sometimes an expanded religious identity serves this purpose.

B) Connected but Separated Communitarianism — The Rise of “Communitarianism”

In many neighborhoods, a social norm is emerging in which identification with the community group is more important than identification with the state. The result: supportive community life — but also closures, internal laws, and other “regulations” that overlap to the point of conflict with the national legal system. This is a problem that helps explain how parallel courts can grow up under the noses of the authorities.

C) Incompatibility of state institutions with ethnic and religious plurality

State mechanisms have not always been able to adapt to the existence of a large religious-cultural diversity within a small, dense area. When public response is limited or opposed, the population seeks other solutions within itself — organizations, private conflict resolution methods, and so on.

D) Islamist ideology and the link to global radicalization

These are not just local-social problems. There are ideological currents that exploit the situation—and global terrorist movements offer “explanations” and identity satisfaction. The case of ISIS/ISIS-K operatives who were captured and tried in Belgium in recent years demonstrates the global-to-local link.

Why the Western world has failed — identity politics, collective guilt, and unwillingness to cope

Europe — including Belgium — has developed the safe formula of recent years: moral righteousness, relocation policies, and calls for humanity towards immigrants. That’s all well and good—until the simple fact is forgotten: a country also needs clear enforcement methods, clear cultural boundaries, and a strong education system that creates civic consensus. Instead, we’ve gotten a dangerous combination of collective guilt (don’t say criticism of origin—that’s racism), and casual tolerance that fosters temporary peace at a future cost.
And it’s not just a matter of “conservatives versus liberals.” It’s a leadership failure: decision-makers were afraid to set clear rules for fear of political and media clashes. The result: dangers don’t receive a serious answer in time; problems drain into certain neighborhoods — and that’s where radicalization finds fertile ground.

What do we do? — Israeli lessons (and why we should pay attention)

As Israelis, we have a hard-hitting advantage: long practical experience in dealing with terrorism, complex immigration policies, and managing national identity in the face of religious pluralism. Here are some practical conclusions, which combine both cynicism and a clear proposal:

1. Don’t be ashamed of a clear definition of core values — a society cannot survive without laws that define what is acceptable and what is not. This is not about cultural repression — it is about refusing to divide the country into an arsenal of parallel rules.
2. A true absorption policy — language learning, which is included in the introduction of workers into the market, and civic education that emphasizes both rights and duties.
3. Smart and determined enforcement — not just laws but effective enforcement: tracking extremist networks, preventing the establishment of parallel legal entities, closing centers that finance radicalization.
4. True community integration — supporting local initiatives that do not come to separate, but to bridge: interfaith collaboration projects, joint employment, and community sports.
5. Anti-ideology — security forces are not enough; We also need an educational methodology against ideologies that recruit young people.

Belgium is not the only case or the only one of its kind. It is a reminder of what happens when groups grow within a state without their basic civil laws being clearly communicated — when the state is afraid to speak up, ideology takes over in places where public peace is only a thin veil.

In conclusion — a simple message in a plea to realistic Zionism: We must not be morally arrogant towards Europe. We have no time for judgment. Instead, let us be practical.
Let us learn the lesson: a society that does not care about its identity, its laws, and public order — will one day find itself, suddenly, faced with phenomena that once seemed like extreme headlines, and are now a matter of today.