Jihadist enclaves? A study on the presence and the extremist risk in Ceuta and Melilla

Abstract

 In recent years, numerous reports and comments have described the Spanish enclaves of Ceuta and Melilla as two main centers of jihadist activity in Spain. In order to find out to what extent that characterization is correct, this article proceeds in several steps. First, a general model for territorial risk assessment related to violent extremism threats is developed. Second, the model is applied to the cases of Ceuta and Melilla in light of the available knowledge about the social reality of both cities. Third, several hypotheses about the presence of jihadism in both cities are proposed. Then, the article presents the findings of an empirical study about the all anti-jihadist operations developed in Ceuta and Melilla until the end of 2015. Those results are also compared with available data on the evolution of the jihadist threat in Spain. After that, several explanations to the jihadist problem in Ceuta and Melilla are discussed. Finally, we conclude with a brief commentary about the future.