{"id":601713,"date":"2026-08-31T16:06:13","date_gmt":"2026-08-31T16:06:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/601713\/"},"modified":"2026-08-31T16:06:13","modified_gmt":"2026-08-31T16:06:13","slug":"morocco-not-to-blame-for-ceuta-border-breach-says-spanish-pm-spain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/601713\/","title":{"rendered":"Morocco not to blame for Ceuta border breach, says Spanish PM | Spain"},"content":{"rendered":"

Spain\u2019s prime minister, Pedro S\u00e1nchez, has said there is no evidence to suggest the Moroccan government was behind last month\u2019s massive border crossing into Ceuta<\/a> but accused Israel and Russia of spreading disinformation.<\/p>\n

As many as 141 people are thought to have died<\/a> trying to enter the Spanish enclave at the end of July. The influx of about 70,000 men, women and children unleashed a political crisis, a humanitarian emergency and reignited tensions within the EU over immigration<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Despite speculation that Rabat may have engineered the mass crossing as a means of showing its displeasure at Spain\u2019s rapprochement with Algeria<\/a>, S\u00e1nchez said there was nothing to indicate the involvement of the Moroccan authorities.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s no information from any intelligence agency that raises doubts over the involvement of Moroccan authorities,\u201d he told Cadena Ser radio on Monday. \u201cCooperation with Morocco<\/a> is frankly positive. I\u2019d like to stress that we need to be aware that this crisis can be resolved only through cooperation \u2013 and not through a lack of trust in Morocco, which would only further aggravate the already complex situation we have in Ceuta.\u201d<\/p>\n

S\u00e1nchez said fake news had been pumped out on social media accounts \u201cassociated with Russia, Israel and the international far right that always use migration to attack not just Spain but also Europe\u201d.<\/p>\n

The accusation drew a furious response from Israel. The country\u2019s foreign minister, Gideon Sa\u2019ar, called it a \u201cbrazen lie\u201d, adding: \u201cContinuing to spread defamatory lies will not distract from S\u00e1nchez\u2019s disgraceful failure to manage his country\u2019s affairs.\u201d<\/p>\n

The \u2060Kremlin rejected allegations \u2060that \u200bRussia was connected to \u2060the Ceuta migration crisis, the \u2060RBC daily \u200breported \u200con \u200cMonday.<\/p>\n

S\u00e1nchez repeated his assertion that the influx was due to the activities of \u201ccriminal gangs\u201d who had used disinformation to falsely claim that a ruling by Spain\u2019s supreme court meant that no one who entered Ceuta by swimming could be deported back to Morocco.<\/p>\n

Although the overwhelming majority of the migrants crossed back into Morocco weeks ago<\/a>, at least 5,000 people, including 1,200 minors, are still on the streets of Ceuta. Their continuing presence has led to clashes between some Ceuta residents and police, while some of the migrants have had their belongings burned while sleeping rough on beaches. On Saturday, four Moroccan migrants were arrested for throwing stones at Spanish soldiers.<\/p>\n

S\u00e1nchez said there would soon be \u201csufficient capacity\u201d to accommodate all those still in the enclave.<\/p>\n

Spain\u2019s conservative People\u2019s party has accused the government of failing to protect the people of Ceuta. \u201cIt did nothing to avoid the invasion on 30 July and it\u2019s doing nothing to stop the public order crisis that\u2019s getting worse every day,\u201d the PP\u2019s leader, Alberto N\u00fa\u00f1ez Feij\u00f3o, said last week.<\/p>\n

Santiago Abascal, the leader of the far-right Vox party, has described events in Ceuta as \u201can invasion and an act of war promoted by Morocco and allowed by S\u00e1nchez, who is incapable of responding because he is subservient to Morocco\u201d.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Spain\u2019s prime minister, Pedro S\u00e1nchez, has said there is no evidence to suggest the Moroccan government was behind…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":601714,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[42,43,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-601713","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-headlines","tag-news","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601713","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=601713"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/601713\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/601714"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=601713"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=601713"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=601713"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}