One theory about the tens of thousands of people who crossed illegally from Morocco into Spain last weekend blamed the greed of smugglers and a misunderstanding of new rules introduced by the Spanish government and upheld by the courts. A second theory suggested that Israel and the United States had decided to punish Spain over its government’s forceful stance on the two countries’ actions in the wars in Gaza and Iran.
But given past incidents, a third possibility appears more plausible: Morocco, like other regimes with powerful monarchies or dictatorships, views human beings as tools — instruments that can be used to gain leverage in geopolitical negotiations. Their vulnerability — exhausted by war in their homelands, homeless and unemployed and, above all, refugees whom governments would rather be rid of — makes them easier to move.
Morocco-Spain: Migrants enter Ceuta en masse by sea
(Photo: Reuters)
In May 2021, a month after Spain admitted a Western Sahara rebel leader to a local hospital for treatment, Moroccan border guards allowed about 10,000 migrants to cross the border. This time, the possible trigger was a visit by Spain’s prime minister to Algeria.
During the visit, he signed political agreements, laid the groundwork for future cooperation and moved to strengthen relations between the two countries. Algeria is Morocco’s bitterest rival in the Maghreb.
Morocco is not alone. The list of countries and leaders who have exploited human beings, including children, to blackmail other states is a long one. Slobodan Milosevic threatened in 1999 to expel millions of ethnic Albanians from Kosovo unless NATO halted its bombing campaign. Belarusian leader Alexander Lukashenko, a Kremlin puppet, brought people in from the Middle East and Africa, transported them to the borders with Poland, Lithuania and Latvia, then had his soldiers tell them: “Either you cross the border or we strangle you. The choice is yours.”
The Kremlin itself allowed hundreds of people to ride bicycles to the borders with Finland and Norway. These are only some of the examples.
Two forces have converged. The first is made up of starving war refugees seeking only to reach the promised land of Europe. But Europe is no longer as eager to receive them. The 2015 migration wave, and especially the identity of many of those who arrived, led to outbreaks of violence, weakened residents’ sense of personal security and fueled an alarming surge in support for the populist right.
The desperation of traditional centrist parties has also driven them to do everything possible to stop accepting migrants and begin deporting those eligible for removal. And if there is one thing dictators and kings relish, it is the intoxicating scent of desperation.
Europe is now a hostage, subject to the whims of leaders who do not share the European Union’s values.
Morocco’s king does not appear particularly concerned about the migrants’ dire humanitarian condition. He trusts European humanitarianism to take care of them.
But Spanish authorities refused to play along. They instructed residents not to help the migrants, calculating that hunger and thirst would drive them back to Morocco. It is a medieval and unacceptable approach.
Europe must show these rulers that it is neither afraid nor vulnerable to blackmail. On the contrary, because of the continent’s demographic crisis, it needs more and more refugees. It should not view them as instruments or weapons deployed against it, or as “weapons of mass migration,” as Kelly Greenhill called them, but as human beings.
A decade ago, all of Europe would have held its breath and shed a tear over every body washed ashore. But with everyone focused last weekend on the European victim whose borders had been breached by tens of thousands of people, almost no one seemed to care that 72 people died trying to cross the border.