Europe finds itself once again at the center of a heated immigration debate. On August 4, 2026, European interior ministers convened an EU-wide emergency summit on borders, following days of accusations and infighting among member states over an incident in which approximately 70,000 people crossed from Morocco into the small Spanish enclave of Ceuta on the North African coast. Ceuta, together with the neighboring enclave of Melilla, constitutes one of only two land borders between European Union territory and the African continent, making these tiny outposts persistent flashpoints in European migration politics.

Many migrants swam several miles across the Mediterranean to bypass the heavily fortified border fence, resulting in 88 people drowning within a 48-hour period. Spanish police, with assistance from Moroccan authorities, escorted the majority of individuals back to Morocco. However, the European far right seized on the episode to push anti-migrant policies further.

While mass crossings into Ceuta are not unprecedented, the event has triggered a new diplomatic crisis within the European Union, drawing comparisons to the 2015 "crisis" when migration similarly threatened to destabilize the bloc. As in that earlier case, the latest episode stems not only from misinformation or large numbers of people seeking safety, but also from disagreements and a lack of coordinated action in Brussels.

What Drove Last Week's Surge in Migration

Moroccans, particularly in the north, have long resented the stark economic disparity between their communities and the nearby Spanish enclaves. Many point to a lack of jobs and educational opportunities as reasons to migrate. Morocco's GDP per capita stood at just US$4,153 in 2024, compared to $26,774 in Ceuta. This inequality has driven some Moroccan "mule women" to carry goods on their backs for sale in Ceuta under hazardous, sometimes deadly, conditions.

Under normal circumstances, several thousand undocumented migrants cross into the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla each year. From January to April 2026, 2,582 people crossed to Ceuta, with roughly 1,000 claiming asylum.

Observers have proposed various explanations for last week's dramatic spike. Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez blamed trafficking networks that spread rumors online about a recent Supreme Court decision stating that Spain could not return people who arrived by sea. When journalists spoke with migrants, many cited social media posts that fueled hopes of swimming to Ceuta and eventually reaching Europe for work and a better life.

The Spanish court ruling addressed a complex legal question: how and when can migrants apply for asylum upon arriving at Spain's borders? This parallels debates taken up by the U.S. Supreme Court in June, when it upheld the Trump administration's pushback policies at the southern U.S. border, ruling that migrants could not apply for asylum because they had not technically entered U.S. territory—since border guards had pushed them back.

The Spanish decision was narrower in scope. It held that migrants cannot be pushed back if they arrive by sea, because there are no physical elements to a maritime border. If the government installed a floating wall extending Ceuta's border fence into the water—which it has now done—then pushbacks would be legal.

Despite the ruling, Spanish police escorted nearly all migrants back to Morocco. Only some individuals of non-Moroccan nationalities were permitted to apply for asylum, and some unaccompanied Moroccan minors were allowed to remain.

Morocco's Strategic Interests

Ceuta and Melilla have been under Spanish control for four centuries, though Morocco considers the enclaves to be occupied Moroccan territory. Beginning in the 1990s and accelerating through the 2000s, Spain strengthened border fortifications between the enclaves and Morocco, driven primarily by fears that sub-Saharan African migrants would cross into Melilla or Ceuta en route to mainland Europe.

Morocco has largely cooperated with the EU to block migration in exchange for substantial financial incentives and diplomatic benefits. That relationship briefly faltered in 2021 over the Moroccan-occupied territory of Western Sahara. After Spain permitted medical treatment for the leader of the Polisario Front—a banned pro-independence group—Moroccan border guards allowed approximately 12,000 people to cross into Ceuta over two days. The dispute was resolved only after Sánchez made overtures to Morocco, acknowledging its rule over the territory.

This time, it is similarly unlikely that tens of thousands could have crossed without the complicity of Moroccan border guards. This led some observers to speculate that the episode represents Moroccan retaliation once again over Spain's positioning on Western Sahara. Notably, the Spanish prime minister visited Algeria—the primary political and financial backer of the Polisario Front—days before the Ceuta incident. The rivalry between Morocco and Algeria for regional influence has made Western Sahara a recurrent pressure point in North African geopolitics, and migration has repeatedly served as leverage in that contest.

The Post-2015 Paradigm

The events also underscore how the EU continues to operate in the long shadow of the 2015 migration "crisis", when more than 1 million people arrived in Greece and Italy from Turkey and North Africa, respectively. Some countries suspended the Schengen zone—which permits the free movement of goods and people across 29 European nations—and reinstated border checks. The European Council adopted a mandatory quota system to distribute the refugee burden more equitably, but it collapsed amid acrimony when Hungary, Poland, and the Czech Republic refused to participate.

For years, legislation to reform EU migration policy stalled in Brussels, leaving the EU with one primary tool: migration management aid—a strategy migration scholars term "externalization," in which the bloc pays neighboring countries to serve as frontline border enforcers. The EU poured nearly $6 billion (over 5 billion euros) in foreign aid into countries including Morocco to address the "root causes of migration," yet migration persisted. As the book "Aiding Autocrats" demonstrates, Europe's migration aid has empowered authoritarian leaders and risks deepening repression.

While Morocco is often regarded by Europe and the U.S. as a stable and reliable North African partner, Moroccans face an often repressive and dismissive government that has failed to address the economic concerns of its citizens. Over the past decade, the government violently crushed popular protests centered on economic and political demands, such as tackling unemployment and reducing corruption. Those demonstrations were especially prominent in the north near Ceuta.

In 2024, after years of deadlock, the EU finally agreed on a more stringent continentwide immigration framework, reinforcing the bloc's rightward shift. The EU Pact on Migration and Asylum, which emphasizes faster deportations and fewer appeal rights for asylum-seekers, came into effect in June 2026—just weeks before the Ceuta surge served as its first major real-world test.

Impact Across Europe

Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, perhaps the EU's most prominent right-wing immigration restrictionist, seized on the Ceuta episode. In a post on X, she stated that "uncontrolled illegal immigration poses a real threat to the security of Europe's borders." Italy, joined by Finland, Austria, Sweden, Denmark, and the Czech Republic, called for Spain to be suspended from the Schengen zone. Meloni also reintroduced border checks with Spain, even though Ceuta is not part of the free-movement area and the two countries do not share a land border.

The August 4 emergency summit continued the pattern set during the 2015 political crisis, after which the EU held more than 20 migration summits attempting to push member states toward coordinated action.

Ahead of the latest summit, European leaders argued that Spain's plan to provide residency and work permits to 500,000 undocumented migrants had incentivized the sudden surge in arrivals. This would contradict historical precedent, however. Both Italy and Greece conducted large-scale regularization programs for undocumented migrants in the 1990s and 2000s, and researchers found no evidence that such processes led to increased undocumented migration. U.S. President Ronald Reagan also oversaw an amnesty program that legalized nearly 3 million people in 1986 and reduced the number of undocumented migrants for decades afterward.

Following the EU summit, member states appeared placated. The European Commission pledged to intensify funding for border security, cooperation with African governments, and increased deportations.

Realistically, however, as long as Europe continues channeling aid toward border enforcement without addressing underlying issues such as economic disparities and poor governance in neighboring countries, further incidents of sudden, large-scale migration are likely—not fewer.

Kelsey Norman, Fellow for the Middle East, Baker Institute for Public Policy, Rice University, and Nicholas R. Micinski, Assistant Professor of Human Rights and Cultural Relations, American University School of International Service.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license.

This story was originally featured on Fortune.com.