Ceuta is in full-blown crisis, with more than 2,000 migrants overwhelming a city of just 84,000 people, yet Madrid's refusal to declare a national emergency amounts to a dereliction of duty. Local leaders are pleading for army deployment as reception centers buckle under the pressure and hundreds are forced to sleep on the streets. Spain's Supreme Court ruling banning sea pushbacks has further constrained authorities, leaving an already dire situation increasingly unmanageable.

As Europe responds to renewed migration pressure in Ceuta, the West continues to portray migration primarily as an external security threat while overlooking its own role in creating many of today's refugee flows. Military interventions, regime-change campaigns and decades of economic and foreign policies have destabilized entire regions and displaced millions. Fortifying borders while ignoring these underlying drivers addresses the symptoms rather than the root causes of migration.