{"id":64781,"date":"2026-08-02T16:06:22","date_gmt":"2026-08-02T16:06:22","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/64781\/"},"modified":"2026-08-02T16:06:22","modified_gmt":"2026-08-02T16:06:22","slug":"spanish-ceuta-witnesses-a-deadly-game-for-moroccan-migrants-government","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/64781\/","title":{"rendered":"Spanish Ceuta witnesses a deadly \u2018game\u2019 for Moroccan migrants | Government"},"content":{"rendered":"

For the past couple of days, I have commuted to work between Europe and Africa. When an estimated 60,000 migrants arrived in Ceuta, Spain\u2019s autonomous outpost on the northern tip of Africa<\/a>, from Morocco this week, businesses shut their doors and all available beds quickly disappeared.<\/p>\n

So, we have been staying in the mainland Spanish port city of Algeciras, taking the one-hour ferry to and from Ceuta.<\/p>\n

A fellow commuter is Isabel Hossein, a port police officer in Algeciras whose home is Ceuta. \u201cI have documents, so it\u2019s easy for me,\u201d she says. \u201cSometimes I cross the border to Morocco just for lunch. Why not? The food is good.\u201d<\/p>\n

Isabel says the mass influx of migrants on Wednesday and Thursday was overwhelming for the residents of Ceuta. \u201cPeople were afraid; there were so many young men everywhere,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am half Christian, half Muslim, as many in Ceuta are. We live peacefully together. But the numbers this time were scary.\u201d<\/p>\n

It has got me thinking about the journeys we take. At Algeciras, hundreds of cars line up daily for the ferry to Tangier. Moroccans from all over Spain, and elsewhere in Europe, depart here to go home for the summer holidays.<\/p>\n

I am told that on motorways in Spain up to 1,000km away, the word \u201cAlgeciras\u201d appears in Arabic to ensure people find their way here. They, of course, have documents.<\/p>\n

In Ceuta, on Saturday, I saw hundreds of young men making their way back to Morocco on foot, under the watchful, occasionally threatening, eye of the Spanish military.<\/p>\n

The undocumented ones<\/p>\n

Exhausted by the heat, 48 hours earlier, the men swam to the shores of Ceuta.<\/p>\n

\u201cFor the good life, humanity, safety, and all the things you need,\u201d Abdelmajid said.<\/p>\n

There was none of that available when they arrived in Ceuta, just extreme heat, thirst and a very hostile reception.<\/p>\n

Of the estimated 60,000 Moroccans who arrived in little more than 24 hours, 90 percent had returned to Morocco by Saturday night.<\/p>\n

Several indicated by rotating their wrists they would simply try again. \u201cThey were told to come. I saw it on Instagram, \u2018Go to Spain and get money, jobs,’\u201d she said. \u201cIt\u2019s all a game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Dozens died in the attempt to reach Ceuta, and on Saturday evening, police divers were still recovering bodies from the surrounding waters.<\/p>\n

\"CEUTA,Alvise Perez, a far-right influencer and member of the European Parliament representing the Se Acabo la Fiesta party, leaves the city centre under police protection [Adri Salido\/Getty Images]<\/p>\n

The Spanish government blames criminal gangs and traffickers. Opposition politicians blame the left-wing Spanish government\u2019s immigration policies for the weekend\u2019s events, some describing it as \u201can invasion\u201d.<\/p>\n

Zia Yusuf<\/a>, a senior figure in the anti-immigration Reform UK party, turned up in Ceuta to join those from the right and far right trying to set their narrative for the events.<\/p>\n

A long way to come for a bit of social media, but this was powerful stuff: in a crisp white shirt and surrounded by muscled minders, I watched Yusuf extract a few words from young men who spoke little English.<\/p>\n

On his X account, he told his nearly 150,000 followers: \u201cI am in Ceuta, the scene of the 60,000 strong invasion. Spain has effectively militarised its border. Already spoken to Moroccan men here who say they are trying to get to Britain. More to come.\u201d<\/p>\n

No one I spoke to said they were heading for Britain. Though I\u2019ve no doubt if you posed the question to someone with a passing idea of what you were asking \u2013 \u201cWould you like to go to Britain?\u201d \u2013 the answer would likely be, \u201cyes\u201d.<\/p>\n

For some, it no doubt is a game. But here in Ceuta, amid the detritus of flippers and rubber floating devices that litter the beaches this weekend, a game with tragic consequences.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"For the past couple of days, I have commuted to work between Europe and Africa. When an estimated…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":64782,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[66,418,593,2249,203,2264,17],"class_list":["post-64781","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-spain","tag-europe","tag-features","tag-government","tag-humanitarian-crises","tag-migration","tag-morocco","tag-spain"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64781","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=64781"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/64781\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/64782"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=64781"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=64781"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=64781"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}