{"id":4833,"date":"2026-09-03T20:26:46","date_gmt":"2026-09-03T20:26:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/?p=4833"},"modified":"2026-09-03T20:30:08","modified_gmt":"2026-09-03T20:30:08","slug":"when-the-moroccan-flag-was-torn-in-spain-to-those-who-think-morocco-will-swallow-the-humiliation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/when-the-moroccan-flag-was-torn-in-spain-to-those-who-think-morocco-will-swallow-the-humiliation\/","title":{"rendered":"When the Moroccan Flag Was Torn in Spain\u2026 To Those Who Think Morocco Will Swallow the Humiliation?"},"content":{"rendered":"<h4 style=\"text-align: justify;\"><strong>When the Moroccan Flag Is Torn in Spain: From the Ceuta Crisis to the Stigmatization of Moroccans as a \u201cFifth Column\u201d<\/strong><\/h4>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">What happened in Spain has now moved beyond the Ceuta crisis itself. When figures from Democracia Nacional symbolically tore the Moroccan flag as a protest against Morocco, while the movement\u2019s accounts circulated messages calling for the flag to \u201cburn,\u201d the gesture was no longer merely a political provocation. It came in a context in which the same movement describes Morocco as \u201cthe enemy of the South\u201d and portrays part of the Moroccan population living in Spain as a potential \u201cfifth column.\u201d<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"ar\" dir=\"rtl\">\ud83c\uddf2\ud83c\udde6\ud83c\uddea\ud83c\uddf8 \u0647\u0646\u0627 \u062a\u062c\u0627\u0648\u0632\u062a\u0645 \u0643\u0644 \u0627\u0644\u062e\u0637\u0648\u0637 \u0627\u0644\u062d\u0645\u0631\u0627\u0621<\/p>\n<p>\u062d\u064a\u0646 \u064a\u064f\u0645\u0632\u064e\u0651\u0642 \u0627\u0644\u0639\u0644\u0645 \u0627\u0644\u0645\u063a\u0631\u0628\u064a \u0623\u0648 \u064a\u064f\u062d\u0631\u064e\u0642\u060c\u062b\u0645 \u064a\u064f\u0642\u0627\u0644 \u0625\u0646 \u0645\u0626\u0627\u062a \u0627\u0644\u0622\u0644\u0627\u0641 \u0645\u0646 \u0627\u0644\u0645\u063a\u0627\u0631\u0628\u0629 \u0641\u064a \u0625\u0633\u0628\u0627\u0646\u064a\u0627 \u0639\u062f\u0648 \u0627\u0644\u062c\u0646\u0648\u0628 \u0648\u0637\u0627\u0628\u0648\u0631 \u062e\u0627\u0645\u0633\u060c \u0641\u0647\u0630\u0647 \u0644\u0645 \u062a\u0639\u062f \u0645\u0633\u0623\u0644\u0629 \u0633\u0628\u062a\u0629 \u0623\u0648 \u0647\u062c\u0631\u0629\u061b \u0647\u0630\u0627 \u062e\u0637\u0627\u0628 \u0643\u0631\u0627\u0647\u064a\u0629 \u064a\u0633\u062a\u0647\u062f\u0641 \u0634\u0639\u0628\u0627\u064b \u0643\u0627\u0645\u0644\u0627\u064b<\/p>\n<p>\u0648\u0627\u0644\u0642\u0627\u0639\u062f\u0629 \u0628\u0633\u064a\u0637\u0629: \u0625\u0630\u0627 \u062a\u0631\u0627\u062c\u0639 \u0627\u0644\u0639\u0642\u0644 \u0623\u0645\u0627\u0645 \u0645\u0646 \u064a\u0646\u0628\u062d\u060c \u064a\u062a\u062d\u0648\u0644 \u0627\u0644\u0646\u0628\u0627\u062d \u0625\u0644\u0649 \u0647\u062c\u0648\u0645 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/Sdy5cdnZSB\">pic.twitter.com\/Sdy5cdnZSB<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&mdash; Diplomatique.ma \u0627\u0644\u062f\u0628\u0644\u0648\u0645\u0627\u0633\u064a\u0629 (@diplomatique_ma) <a href=\"https:\/\/x.com\/diplomatique_ma\/status\/2095598427702702163?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 3, 2026<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.x.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The facts need to be stated precisely. In Spain, what is currently documented is the symbolic tearing of the Moroccan flag by Democracia Nacional president Pedro Chaparro and vice-president Gonzalo Mart\u00edn. The movement\u2019s publications also used rhetoric calling for the flag to \u201cburn.\u201d That does not establish that the flag was actually burned during the same action. The distinction matters. In a case this sensitive, facts must remain stronger than slogans.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The deeper problem, however, lies in the continuity of the rhetoric. On July 31, following the mass migration crisis in Ceuta, Democracia Nacional published a statement entitled \u201cAnte la invasi\u00f3n marroqu\u00ed de Ceuta,\u201d calling for \u201cthe vast majority\u201d of Moroccan immigrants living in Spain to return to Morocco. The movement even asked whether Spain should maintain a \u201cpotential fifth column\u201d of a possible enemy on its territory in the event of armed conflict. Morocco was described as \u201cthe enemy of the South,\u201d while Ceuta, Melilla and the Canary Islands were presented as Spanish territories requiring greater protection.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">That shift is significant. A migration crisis, however serious, can be debated in terms of border control, security, government responsibility or bilateral cooperation. But when such a crisis is used to redirect attention toward hundreds of thousands of people because of their national origin, the debate enters another territory. The issue is no longer only Ceuta or the border. It becomes a question of the place assigned to Moroccans within Spanish society and, more broadly, of how a political movement attempts to turn an entire population into a collective suspect.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The numbers give this rhetoric a significance that cannot simply be dismissed. According to Spain\u2019s National Statistics Institute, Moroccan citizens were the largest foreign nationality in Spain on January 1, 2025, with nearly 969,000 people, representing around 14% of all foreign nationals. Beyond that figure are people born in Morocco who have since acquired Spanish nationality. This is therefore not a marginal or temporary population. Moroccans and Spaniards of Moroccan origin have long been part of Spain\u2019s social, economic and human reality.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">That is precisely why the expression \u201cfifth column\u201d carries such weight. It does not merely describe an immigrant population as problematic. It suggests questionable loyalty, a potentially hostile presence and an internal threat linked to national origin. Yet the Spanish government itself has recently acknowledged the importance of the Moroccan community and agreed with Morocco on a joint strategy against hate speech. The contrast between that institutional approach and the rhetoric of Democracia Nacional is difficult to overlook.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">It is equally important to distinguish Democracia Nacional from Spain as a whole. The movement\u2019s rhetoric cannot be presented as the position of the Spanish state or of Spanish society as a whole. Spain and Morocco have maintained a formal framework of friendship, cooperation and good-neighbourly relations for decades. Bilateral ties have also deepened considerably in recent years, particularly in economic, security, judicial and migration matters. Madrid and Rabat are also working together in preparations for the 2030 World Cup.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">That is precisely what makes the extremist rhetoric politically more troubling. On one side, the two states are building mechanisms of cooperation because their interests and societies are deeply interconnected. On the other, certain groups seek to portray the southern neighbour as a permanent enemy and Moroccans living in Spain as a potential threat. These are two fundamentally different visions, and they should not be confused.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">The Ceuta crisis has provided this political current with particularly fertile ground. On September 2, the movement called for demonstrations in several Spanish cities, using anti-Morocco slogans and demanding \u201cmass deportations\u201d and \u201cremigration.\u201d Other Spanish far-right groups also attempted to politically exploit the crisis. At the same time, thousands of citizens demonstrated in Ceuta in a largely peaceful setting, demanding answers to an extraordinary migration situation. Spanish society, therefore, cannot be reduced to the slogans of its most radical political groups.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">More importantly, Madrid itself has not confirmed the most serious accusations made against Rabat. On September 3, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro S\u00e1nchez told Congress that he had no evidence allowing him to state that the Moroccan government had planned or carried out the mass entry into Ceuta. He acknowledged that Moroccan gendarmes had allowed people to cross for several hours, but maintained a distinction between that fact and the existence of a Moroccan government decision to organize the operation.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">That distinction is crucial. It means that even in the middle of an exceptionally serious crisis, Spanish institutions are still distinguishing between what is established, what is suspected and what remains to be proven. That is precisely the discipline abandoned by the most radical rhetoric when it turns a complex crisis into an invasion narrative, and then turns that invasion narrative into a collective accusation against a national community.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">There is also a legal dimension. Article 510 of the Spanish Criminal Code penalizes, under specific circumstances, the public promotion or incitement of hatred, hostility, discrimination or violence against groups on grounds including national, ethnic or racial origin. This does not mean that Democracia Nacional\u2019s statements automatically constitute a criminal offence; only judicial authorities can determine that in a specific case. But the repeated public portrayal of a national community as a \u201cfifth column,\u201d combined with calls for mass expulsion, raises a legal and political question serious enough not to be dismissed.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Morocco, for its part, has no interest in turning this provocation into a confrontation with Spain. The relationship between the two countries is too important, and their societies too closely connected, for the slogans of an extremist movement to dictate state policy. But that does not mean that the humiliation of the Moroccan flag should be normalized, nor that Moroccans living in Spain should gradually be placed in the position of a collective suspect.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Morocco\u2019s historical memory is long, and it knows the difference between a diplomatic disagreement, a political crisis and an assault on national dignity. The history of relations between the two shores of the Strait has experienced enough periods of tension to understand where words can lead when they cease to be mere slogans. Today, the strongest response is not escalation but clarity: Morocco can continue cooperating with Spain, defend its interests and preserve dialogue while firmly rejecting the transformation of an entire community into an \u201cinternal enemy.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: justify;\">Because the real danger is not only a torn flag. It begins when people whose family history carries that flag are themselves gradually made to look like a threat.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>When the Moroccan Flag Is Torn in Spain: From the Ceuta Crisis to the Stigmatization of Moroccans as a \u201cFifth Column\u201d What happened in Spain has now moved beyond the Ceuta crisis itself. When figures from Democracia Nacional symbolically tore the Moroccan flag as a protest against Morocco, while the movement\u2019s accounts circulated messages calling [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":4835,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39,43,42,41,76],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4833","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-africa","category-asia-americas","category-europe-russia","category-middle-east","category-the-maghreb"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4833","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4833"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4833\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4834,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4833\/revisions\/4834"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4835"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4833"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4833"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/diplomatique.ma\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4833"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}