Just days ago, Spain’s North African enclave of Ceuta—the same strategic gateway whence the original Muslim conquest of Spain began in A.D. 711—was once again overrun by Muslim masses arriving from Africa.
Over the course of several days, over 50,000 migrants breached the city’s borders, overwhelming local authorities and forcing Madrid to deploy emergency measures.
The images are striking: endless columns of young Muslim men streaming into European territory by land and sea—through the very corridor that, more than thirteen centuries earlier, served as the launching point for one of the most consequential invasions in Western history.
Nor is any of this new or shocking. As one of many examples, in 2021, 6,000 Muslims invaded Ceuta. They came “by sea, either swimming or with inflatables, all in a bid to eventually get to mainland Europe.”
Nor is Ceuta an isolated episode. Spain has for years experienced a steady surge of illegal Muslim migration from Africa. In 2020 alone, some 23,000 migrants reached the Canary Islands—a 234 percent increase over the previous year. The numbers continued climbing, with more than 1,600 arriving over just three days in October 2023. As one report noted:
Of the boats that arrived over the weekend, one on Saturday was carrying 320 migrants. The state news agency EFE said it was the largest number in a single boat since human traffickers began to regularly use the Canary Island route in 1994. The previous record of 280 was recorded earlier this month.
Once arriving on Spanish territory, such migrants invariably engage in unsavory and downright criminal behavior—including gang-rape, murder, church desecrations and slaughter of Christians; and they create enclaves, or ribats, where police fear to tread.
Indeed, just a few days ago, we learned that “Spain reports highest number of arrests for Islamist extremism in EU.” This is certainly saying something considering that the EU itself is a hotbed of jihadist activity.
At any rate, to understand why Ceuta matters—and why today’s events are so historically significant—we need to return to the year 711 AD.
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