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Migrants return to Morocco from the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, Friday, July 31, 2026.<\/p>\n
Antonio Sempere\/AP Photo\/Antonio Sempere<\/p>\n
A migrant swims back to Morocco from the Spanish enclave of Ceuta on Friday 31 July 2026.<\/p>\n
Antonio Sempere\/AP Photo\/Antonio Sempere<\/p>\n
Migrants try to cross from Morocco into the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, Friday, July 31, 2026.<\/p>\n
Antonio Sempere\/AP Photo\/Antonio Sempere<\/p>\n
Migrants return to Morocco from the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, Friday, July 31, 2026.<\/p>\n
Antonio Sempere\/AP Photo\/Antonio Sempere<\/p>\n
Migrants return to Morocco from the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, Friday, July 31, 2026.<\/p>\n
Antonio Sempere\/AP Photo\/Antonio Sempere<\/p>\n
CEUTA, Spain (AP) \u2014 When he heard the border had been breached, Abdulah Buji jumped on his motorbike and raced from his home in northern Morocco toward Ceuta, joining tens of thousands of people trying to swim into the tiny Spanish territory in North Africa.<\/p>\n
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Like many of his fellow countrymen, Buji was inspired by the thought that this collective crossing could somehow unlock his dream of reaching Spain and starting a new life in Europe.<\/p>\n
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\u201cSpain gives you the chance to make your future, not like Morocco,\u201d said Buji, a 21-year-old who is studying to be a teacher. \u201cI am a talented boy. I just want a chance.\u201d<\/p>\n
But his elation at setting foot on Spanish soil was quickly followed by the disheartening realization that he was still far from his ultimate goal. Mainland Europe rested across the Mediterranean, and he and the new arrivals were unwanted. Spanish authorities ordered everyone to turn around and go back or face eventual expulsion.<\/p>\n
Buji said he almost joined more than 50 people who died trying to reach Ceuta while swimming around a border fence. He made it across, but he lost his belongings and money in the crossing. When he realized that he would likely face legal limbo and detention, he turned around and headed back.<\/p>\n
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\u201cI\u2019ve spent perhaps 14 years studying, but there\u2019s nothing at home, and I\u2019d have to work 12-hour shifts for a meager wage,\u201d Buji told The Associated Press. \u201cThat\u2019s why I came here, but I haven\u2019t found any opportunities here either, so I have to go back.\u201d<\/p>\n
A surge in migrants created a humanitarian crisis<\/p>\n
Of the 60,000 people who crossed between Thursday and Friday morning, some 45,000 had returned to Moroccan territory within hours after many spent the night on the streets of Ceuta amid startled locals and armed Spanish police and soldiers.<\/p>\n
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The massive influx of people, which totaled 70% of Ceuta\u2019s resident population, sparked calls by local Spanish authorities for police and the army to establish order. Locals were concerned by the thousands of mostly young men aimlessly walking the streets.<\/p>\n
Ceuta\u2019s residents recalled a similar but smaller migration crisis in 2021, when the Moroccan government dropped its border controls and let several thousand people from Morocco and sub-Saharan countries into Ceuta over two days. The city faced a much larger humanitarian crisis this time.<\/p>\n
People flee out of despair and wanting to help their families<\/p>\n
As the first reports and videos of migrants reaching Ceuta spread on social media, more people headed north in hopes of reaching European Union territory. Train stations in Morocco\u2019s capital, Rabat, and in the country\u2019s largest city, Casablanca, were crowded with people trying to travel to the border with Ceuta. Local media showed police officers preventing some of them from boarding trains and buses.<\/p>\n
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It isn\u2019t clear what triggered the influx, but social media was awash with posts encouraging Moroccans to try to enter Ceuta days before it began, said Myriam Cherti, a senior researcher at the University of Oxford\u2019s Centre on Migration, Policy and Society. The posts included practical information on how to cross the border and what migrants should say to increase their chances of being allowed to stay.<\/p>\n
Cherti said some of the migrants she interviewed over the past year had lost count of the number of times they had tried to cross the border.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019re doing it out of despair, they\u2019re doing it because they\u2019ve tried other ways to build a life and failed, they\u2019re doing it because they feel the obligation that they want to help their families and support them,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd that\u2019s possible if they make it to Spain and not necessarily possible if they stay\u201d in Morocco.<\/p>\n
Ahmed Karim, 33, was among those who managed to cross into Ceuta. He doesn’t have work and says the problem is compounded for many Moroccans due to the difficulty in traveling outside the country.<\/p>\n
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He said many Moroccans want to go to Europe or America, \u201cbut they don\u2019t have the opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n
Searching for loved ones in the chaos<\/p>\n
Other people who crossed, however, were not coming to stay; they were searching for lost loved ones and hoping they were not among the dead.<\/p>\n
Ikrra Khai, 33, is one of thousands of Moroccan women who regularly get temporary job permits to work on Spanish farms at harvest time.<\/p>\n
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On Friday she was in Ceuta looking for her sister’s son.<\/p>\n
\u201cI don\u2019t know if he is dead or alive,\u201d she said. \u201cI have his residency card. But I don\u2019t know where he is. I\u2019m searching.\u201d<\/p>\n
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Joseph Wilson reported from Barcelona, Spain. Danica Kirka in London and Akram Oubachir in Fnideq, Morocco, contributed.<\/p>\n
___ This version corrects that Ikrra Khai, a Moroccan woman, was in Ceuta looking for her sister\u2019s son, not the brother of a friend.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Migrants return to Morocco from the Spanish enclave of Ceuta, Friday, July 31, 2026. Antonio Sempere\/AP Photo\/Antonio Sempere…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":395475,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[139060,139057,139056,10462,139059,139055,107698,139058,23681,59373,59371,86159,61262,82,84,83,9611],"class_list":["post-395474","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-antonio","tag-ahmed-karim","tag-akram-oubachir","tag-danica-kirka","tag-europe","tag-joseph-wilson","tag-migrants-spain-ceuta-morocco","tag-morocco","tag-myriam-cherti","tag-package-100024-ap-online","tag-package-100373-mc-complete-state-national","tag-product-30598-ap-national-news-report-a-wire","tag-product-32502-ap-online-europe-news","tag-product-46986-ap-online-top-stories","tag-san-antonio","tag-san-antonio-headlines","tag-san-antonio-news","tag-spain"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395474","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=395474"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/395474\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/395475"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=395474"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=395474"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-tx\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=395474"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}