How Social Media Sparked a Refugee Crisis Between Spain and Morocco
A wave of disinformation online contributed to a surge of migrants in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta who were trying to reach Europe, resulting in about 90 deaths. By Steven Lee Myers Aida Alami and Carlos Barragán Two days before tens of thousands of migrants surged into Ceuta , one of Spain’s enclaves on Morocco’s northern coast, a newspaper there posted a video on TikTok and Instagram showing two young women walking in the city in wet suits, their hair still damp. The posts didn’t say so explicitly, but the implication was clear: The women had just swum across the border from Morocco. “Ceuta can’t take it anymore,” the newspaper, El Faro de Ceuta, declared in the posts. On the other side of the border, the video resonated very differently. Cropped and reposted in Arabic, the video seemed like an invitation.
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A wave of disinformation online contributed to a surge of migrants in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta who were trying to reach Europe, resulting in about 90 deaths. By Steven Lee Myers Aida Alami and Carlos Barragán Two days before tens of thousands of migrants surged into Ceuta , one of Spain’s enclaves on Morocco’s northern coast, a newspaper there posted a video on TikTok and Instagram showing two young women walking in the city in wet suits, their hair still damp. The posts didn’t say so explicitly, but the implication was clear: The women had just swum across the border from Morocco. “Ceuta can’t take it anymore,” the newspaper, El Faro de Ceuta, declared in the posts. On the other side of the border, the video resonated very differently. Cropped and reposted in Arabic, the video seemed like an invitation.