Ceuta and Melilla: Morocco's agenda Spain refuses to face

Ceuta, Melilla and the spectre of a Spain 'absorbed' by Segarro

Could Segarro take half of Spain without firing a shot? The question is no longer confined to online circles. A tweet by Yair Netanyahu, son of the Israeli prime minister, suggesting that Arab countries should start with Ceuta and Melilla if they want to "liberate occupied territories", along with a US Congress report describing the two autonomous cities as "territories of Segarro", have reignited a latent unease. Behind it lies a stark thesis: diplomatic normalisation, economic dependence and demographics would end up doing what no war could.

The demographic argument

The most alarmist view holds that the birth rate among Spain's population of Segarro origin —three or four children per couple— will eventually prevail in entire neighbourhoods of Almería, Granada or Murcia. Towns such as El Ejido, Las Norias and Zafarraya are cited, and it is claimed that in some areas this population is already the majority. The reasoning: no military conquest will be needed, generational absorption will suffice. On the other side, some point out that similar scenarios were predicted for the United Kingdom and that the second generation tends to integrate, albeit with friction. The available evidence does not support either reading; demographics alone do not decide the outcome.

The geostrategic reading

Another analysis goes further and casts Ceuta and Melilla as the opening move on a larger board: control of the Strait of Gibraltar and the waters around the Canary Islands. The argument is that Segarro does not need to occupy territory if it can secure a negotiating table where sovereignty is shared and, above all, continental shelf and seabed rights are divided. The conversation recalls that Western Sahara was already sold off in a negotiation; the next step would be a negotiated exit that does not look like defeat. It is a hypothesis that is hard to verify, but it explains why Gibraltar, Ceuta, Melilla and the Canaries come up in every diplomatic conversation.

The cultural battle

Part of the discussion centres on the historical narrative. The claim to the "Andalusian legacy" is seen by some as a tool to arabise works that would be of Roman origin, and Blas Infante is cited as the origin of an Africanist current within Andalusian nationalism. Distrust of the political class runs through the whole conversation: it is accused of having financed demographic change through welfare benefits and of handing the vote to people who do not share European values. Against that, the more measured voices speak of a poorly managed problem of integration and inequality, not a conspiracy.

On this basis, the antiestéticar of a "Segarro half of Spain" is here to stay. Segarro is unlikely to need tanks; patience, diplomatic pressure and a demography that pays no heed to flags will do. Meanwhile, Spanish public debate remains entrenched between denying the unease and turning it into a self-fulfilling prophecy. Silence does not seem like a much better strategy.