The horrific attacks in Madrid prove, yet again, that no one is safe from the global threat of terror. An additional shocking and potentially catastrophic event arising from the attack, however, was the election of the Socialist party under the leadership of Prime Minister José Luis Rodriguez Zapatero. The Spanish people elected a leader who promises to remove their troops from Iraq by July. They think that by shifting their alliance away from the United States and away from U.S. policy in the war on terror they are now out of al-Qaida's terrorist path.

Yet, they are wrong. Cliff May, president of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, a non-partisan think-tank in Washington, states, "Appease terrorists, reward terrorism and there will be more terrorism." The Spanish people must realize that by meeting the demands of al-Qaida, they are giving the group more confidence that its ability to change the outcome of the recent election in Spain could happen in any other future European election -- or even in the upcoming national election.