Fresh disorder erupted in Ceuta on Sunday as groups of illegal migrants resisted removal, ran through the Spanish enclave and marched while chanting ‘Allahu akbar’, according to footage recorded by German outlet NIUS and widely circulated on social media.
Reporter Helena Gebhard said migrants being moved from a reception facility towards military trucks resisted the operation, entered residential areas and were eventually driven back towards the beaches by police using batons. She also filmed several men jumping from trucks transporting them towards Morocco.
The scenes cut sharply against the narrative promoted by Pedro Sánchez’s government—and repeated in much international coverage—that Madrid had restored control within 48 hours and returned ‘practically all’ those who entered.
The Interior Ministry said 48,300 of roughly 50,000 arrivals had gone back, implying that fewer than 2,000 remained. Yet Ceuta’s president, Juan Jesús Vivas, said 3,000 to 5,000 were still in the streets and that the crisis ‘remains open’. El País reported on Monday that thousands were still sleeping outdoors, moving through residential districts and hiding from soldiers.
Sharing the footage of migrants chanting ‘Allahu akbar’ in Ceuta, Austrian anti-immigration activist Martin Sellner accused the Sánchez government of lying about the situation in the Spanish enclave in North Africa. Dutch activist Eva Vlaardingerbroek wrote that migrants whom the prime minister had supposedly sent back were again ‘storming the city’.
Local reporting equally underscored these claims. Salva Ortega, a citizen of Ceuta who has been actively documenting the invasion since day one, appealed for real information from the city to be spread ‘as widely as possible’, arguing that Sánchez had betrayed the Spanish people.
The backlash is already visible across Spain. Thousands demonstrated over the weekend in several locations, including Madrid, Palma, Valencia and Alicante, against the management of the current crisis and the broader migration policy of the Sánchez government. Demonstrators called for stronger borders and mass returns, while blaming both Madrid and Rabat for the current situation.
Pressure is also mounting abroad. Leaders of 22 EU states called for coordinated action against the mass regularization scheme introduced by Sánchez’s government in April, arguing that it works as a pull factor for mass migration. EU interior ministers are due to hold an extraordinary meeting on Tuesday regarding the situation.
The Trump administration went further: the State Department blamed the crisis on Madrid’s efforts to facilitate mass illegal migration, while President Donald Trump called the scenes ‘terrible’ and blamed ‘weak laws’ and ‘bad management’. Washington also advised Americans to reconsider travel to Ceuta because the uncontrolled influx could create ‘unpredictable and dangerous security situations’.
Sánchez, however, rejects that account. He says trafficking networks exploited misinformation, insists that Morocco cooperated in the returns and accuses European critics of acting out of prejudice, misinformation or political interest.
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