After a relatively successful first half of his big trip abroad last week, Donald Trump punctuated his final sweep through Europe with an abrupt return to churlish form, shoving a world leader out of the way for a photo-op, forcing people to engage in deeply awkward handshakes, and insulting NATO allies in front of the new NATO headquarters. Trump concluded the trip by declining to affirm the U.S. commitment to the Paris Climate Accord and calling Germans “bad, very bad,” on account of all the cars they sell in the U.S., perhaps forgetting—or never knowing in the first place—that auto giants like B.M.W. and Mercedes actually manufacture many of their vehicles in the U.S. None of this went over particularly well in Germany.

On Saturday, German chancellor Angela Merkel said in Munich that Europe must “really take our fate into our own hands,” since old alliances between the continent and the U.S. were not what they once were. “The times in which we could rely fully on others—they are somewhat over,” Merkel said. “This is what I experienced in the last few days.”

Merkel had tried her best to improve relations with the Trump administration, brushing off a particularly uncomfortable first meeting at the White House in March—during which Trump conspicuously avoided shaking Merkel’s hand in front of the press—by staying in touch with the White House and cultivating a relationship with Ivanka Trump. But the Merkel-Trump meetings in Brussels and Sicily were apparently too much even for the stoical chancellor. Merkel is said to have been particularly rankled by Trump’s failure to “endorse language supporting free trade” or support the Paris climate agreement. And German Social Democrat leader Martin Schulz, who will face off with Merkel in the national elections in September, is, for once, in full agreement.

“A stronger cooperation of European countries on all levels is the answer to Donald Trump,” he told public broadcaster ARD on Sunday. In a video published by Deutsche Welle on Monday, a clearly agitated Schulz chided Trump for “believ[ing] he could inflict humiliation in Brussels.” A bitter campaign between Merkel and Schulz notwithstanding, Schulz tore into Trump and even threw his support behind Merkel, saying “the chancellor represents all of us at summits like these, and I reject with outrage the way this man takes it upon himself to treat the head of our country's government . . . That is unacceptable.”

Indeed, a severe dislike of Trump appears to have united Germans across political parties. In one February poll, 78 percent of Germans said they were “very concerned” about Trump’s policies. And the consequences of the deteriorated relationship could have significant consequences. “This seems to be the end of an era, one in which the United States led and Europe followed,” Ivo Daalder, director of the Chicago Council of Global affairs and former U.S. envoy to NATO, told The Washington Post. “Today, the United States is heading into a direction on key issues that seems diametrically opposite of where Europe is heading. Merkel’s comments are an acknowledgment of that new reality.”

The White House, naturally, threw cold water on reports of a deepening transatlantic enmity. “It’s not true,” Press Secretary Sean Spicer wrote on Twitter last week in response to a New York Times reporter highlighting Trump’s “bad, very bad” comments on German car production. And, just as naturally, Trump followed up by throwing his spokesman under the bus. “We have a MASSIVE trade deficit with Germany, plus they pay FAR LESS than they should on NATO & military,” he tweeted Tuesday morning, attacking Merkel after reports emerged about her quiet denunciation of U.S.-German relations. “Very bad for U.S. This will change . . .“