Officials across Europe were calling for even stronger border controls, stricter screening of those arriving and some way to persuade people to stay in the Middle East.
So far, it is mostly talk. But in recent weeks, European countries from Sweden to Slovenia have been enacting new border controls, erecting border fences and discussing ways to better screen and register the migrants.
And since the attacks by militants, and the discovery of a passport of a recent Syrian migrant near the scene of a suicide bombing, the rising antimigrant sentiment seems poised to substantially shift the conversation. Perhaps it could even change both policies and attitudes toward the migrants, as they arrive, make their way across Europe and land in the countries where they hope to make their homes.
In the short run, this shift in tone could complicate the only significant plan that the European Union now has to slow down or bring order to the resettling of more than a million people: its plans to relocate 160,000 migrants across Europe. It could also affect future attempts by the bloc and others to fashion a more comprehensive and unified approach to the crisis.
Germany, which has accepted the largest number of migrants and is the destination of choice for many of them, is crucial to any solution to the crisis. But even there resistance is growing.
“The days of uncontrolled immigration and illegal entry can’t continue just like that,” insisted Markus Söder