Nathan Shachar: Royal visit to Ceuta part of delicate political calculation

Felipe VI and Queen Letizia arrive in Ceuta on Tuesday, almost 20 years after the king's parents Juan Carlos I and Queen Sofia made the same trip - and then triggered a fierce reaction from King Mohamed VI, who recalled his ambassador to Madrid and mobilized the regime-loyal press against Spain. Morocco, but not the UN, considers Ceuta and Melilla to be occupied Moroccan territories. During his eight years in power, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez has ruled out more royal visits there.

But this time al-Mahzen, the king's inner circle of friends and advisers, would hardly recommend such drastic reactions. Mohamed VI does not want to see Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez and his Socialist Party lose the Spanish elections in November. And he knows that the migration crisis at the end of July, when nearly 100,000 people entered Ceuta while Moroccan authorities helped or refrained from intervening, hurt Sánchez politically.

For the right-wing populist Vox, which is ahead in the polls ahead of the election, the migration fiasco in Ceuta was a gift. Demand for a royal visit to what Spain sees as sovereign Spanish territory has grown, and the left-wing coalition's only way to remove the issue from the agenda is to allow the visit, whatever Morocco's views on the matter may be.

Pedro Sánchez has done everything he could to keep Mohamed VI in good spirits. It was his idea to propose a joint hosting – Spain-Portugal-Morocco – of the 2030 World Cup. And it was he who, in 2022, made the historic, and for the Spanish left shocking, decision to stop supporting the Sahrawi people's demand for independence in Western Sahara, the former Spanish colony most of which is controlled by Morocco. Shortly after that gift, Mohamed VI severely embarrassed Sánchez by inviting him and then not accepting him.