Opposition lawmakers say the crossing of tens of thousands of people could not have happened without Moroccan border guards standing down. Sen. José Antonio Monago of the Popular Party pointed to a second attempted mass crossing on Aug. 15 that Rabat blocked, saying it "sheds new light" on what happened weeks earlier.
Vox lawmaker Javier Alonso went further, accusing Rabat of waging "a hybrid war against Spain" behind a government eager to frame the crossing as routine migration — a view echoed by retired Maj. Gen. Vicente Díaz de Villegas y Herrería, who said Morocco is using migrants as leverage to destabilize Spanish politics.
The government has largely avoided confrontation with Rabat. Foreign Minister José Manuel Albares said he is in daily contact with his Moroccan counterpart, and Interior Minister Fernando Grande-Marlaska has praised the bilateral relationship.
The exception came from Defense Minister Margarita Robles, who pushed back after Moroccan officials revived territorial claims to Ceuta and Melilla days into the crisis: "Any attack on Ceuta or Melilla is an attack on the whole of Spain", she said, adding that "this cannot happen again". The Foreign Ministry added only that Spanish territorial integrity is not open to negotiation.
Commentators have tied the standoff to a shifting balance of power. Morocco's leverage has grown alongside its control of the world's largest phosphate reserves, a key fertilizer ingredient whose global supply chains gained strategic weight after the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz — deepening U.S. economic and military engagement with Rabat.
Some Spanish columnists have also linked the timing of the crisis to Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez's visit to Algeria, a rival of Morocco's over Western Sahara, 10 days before migrants crossed; a similar pattern preceded a 2021 Ceuta crisis that followed Spain's decision to treat a Western Sahara separatist leader in a Spanish hospital.
The dispute has spilled beyond Spain's borders. Brussels criticized Madrid in the crisis's early days, and Italy briefly imposed border checks on Spanish travelers, reflecting broader European tension over migration policy.
Inside Ceuta, the humanitarian situation remains unresolved. Between 5,000 and 8,000 migrants who arrived in July are still in the enclave, including more than 2,100 identified minors awaiting placement either back in Morocco or at shelters elsewhere in Spain — a process slowed by resistance from Popular Party- and Vox-led regions. Madrid has pledged EUR 25 million to expand facilities in Ceuta, though local leader Juan Vivas, of the Popular Party, has shown less willingness to cooperate with the central government than during the 2021 crisis, as public opinion on migration hardens nationally ahead of regional, local and parliamentary elections.
The government has meanwhile pointed to record social security enrollment following this year's legalization of undocumented migrants as evidence of economic gains. But as commentators have noted, invoking political scientist Giovanni Sartori, migration "is above all a non-economic problem" — one unlikely to be settled by economic arguments alone.
(jh)
Source: PAP