1018-8 Islam in Spain

Islam in Spain

Islam was a widespread religion in what is now Spain and Portugal for nine centuries, beginning with the Umayyad conquest of Hispania and ending (at least overtly) with its prohibition by the modern Spanish state in the mid-16th century and the expulsion of the Moriscos in the early 17th century. Although a significant proportion of Moriscos returned to Spain or avoided expulsion through various means, and the decree never affected the country's large enslaved Muslim population, the indigenous practice of Islam is considered to have been effectively extinguished by the 19th century.^[1]

Nevertheless, throughout history there has always been a constant presence of Muslims in Spain, many of which were former slaves (known as 'moros cortados') freed in the early 18th century. Furthermore, Spain's proximity to North Africa and its small land border with the Kingdom of Morocco (as well as a colonial presence in North Africa lasting between 1912 and 1975) made Muslim presence in Spain inevitable. Moroccan Muslims played a significant role in Spain's Civil War (1936-1939), fighting on the National side, including a Lieutenant General Mohamed Meziane, a close friend of General Francisco Franco, who later became Captain General of Ceuta, Galicia and the Canary Islands during his post-war career.

Moroccans did not require a visa to enter Spain until 1985. This however changed with Spain's growing economic development and its entry into the European Union, after which stricter immigration controls were imposed. In 1987, Spain's first Mosque was built since Islamic times in the province of Cordoba by the Ahmadiya community. Immigration to Spain exploded in the 90s, Moroccans of both sexes arriving in large numbers and becoming Spain's first important economic immigrant community. In the 2000s migrants started arriving in some numbers from other Muslim-majority countries (as well as from Latin America and Eastern Europe). Moroccans are currently Spain's oldest and most integrated immigrant community and second-largest foreign population after Romanians.

A cell of Moroccan terrorists were responsible for the Madrid 2004 bombings, Europe's deadliest terrorist attack in modern history. Nevertheless, Spain's long history with Basque terrorism, its highly polarized political atmosphere at the time, and the insistence by a significant portion of the Spanish right in blaming first ETA and then a police/socialist sponsored conspiracy for the bombing,^[2] all played a role in neutralizing any potential backlash against the country's Moroccan/Muslim community.

As of 2015, Spain officially had 1,887,906 Muslims out of a total population of 46,449,565 or slightly above 4% of the total population. Out of these 1,108,826, or 58.7% were immigrants without Spanish citizenship. Spain's Muslim community includes 779,080 Spanish citizens (41% of total) and 749,274 Moroccan citizens (39.6% of the Muslim community and over 67% of Muslim foreigners). Other smaller communities include Pakistanis, Bangladeshis, Algerians, Senegalese and Nigerians. As for Muslims with Spanish citizenship, in 2015 these included 251,517 naturalized citizens (mainly from Morocco), 433,030 descendants of naturalized citizens, 71,725 Ceuta/Melilla Muslims (naturalized by decree in the early 80s) and 22,808 were Spaniards of Catholic background who had converted to Islam for marriage or out of religious conviction

Hispania was the Latin name given to the whole Iberian Peninsula (covering the territories of present-day Spain and Portugal), and after the fall of theWestern Roman Empire (476) the Teutonic tribe of Visigoths ended up ruling the whole peninsula until the Islamic conquest (during that time they pushed another Teutonic tribe out—the Vandals – and conquered another one—the Suevi). It is frequently stated in historical sources that Spain was one of the former Roman provinces where the Latin language and culture grew deep roots. After the fall of the Empire, the Visigoths continued the tradition by becoming probably the most Romanized of all Teutonic tribes.

On April 30, 711, Islamic leader Tariq ibn-Ziyad landed at Gibraltar and by the end of the campaign most of the Iberian Peninsula (except for small areas in the north-west such as Asturias and the Basque territory) were brought under Islamic rule. This campaign's turning point was the battle of Guadalete, where the last Visigothic king, Roderick, was defeated and killed on the battlefield. After this eight-year campaign, Muslim forces attempted to move north-east across the Pyrenees Mountains toward France, but were defeated by the Frankish Christian Charles Martel at the Battle of Tours in 732.

It is commonly held that the relative ease that the Arab armies conquered the Iberian Peninsula with was due to the centralized nature of government under the rule of the Visigoths. After the defeat of Roderick, the Visigoth dominion over the Iberian peninsula folded and fell apart from the Northern coast of Spain, and the province of Septimania (an area of France going from the Pyrenees to Provence), all areas previously under the rule of the Visigoths were under Islamic rule.

Several historical sources state that the Islamic caliphate had not actually targeted Spain for conquest, but that political divisions within the Visigothic kingdom created an opportunity that Tariq and his army exploited successfully. For example, King Roderick was not considered a legitimate ruler by all the inhabitants of the Kingdom, and some Visigothic nobles actually aided the Islamic conquest. One name frequently mentioned is Count Julian of Ceuta in North Africa (this version calls him a Gothic noble), who according to some stories invited Tariq to invade because his daughter had been raped by King Roderick. Other sources instead consider Count Julian to be the last representative of the Eastern Roman Empire in North Africa.

Islamic rule in the Iberian peninsula lasted for varying periods ranging from only 28 years in the extreme northwest (Galicia) to 781 years in the area surrounding the city of Granada in the southeast. While the three major monotheistic religious traditions certainly did borrow from one another in Muslim-ruled Spain, benefiting especially by the blooming of philosophy and the medieval sciences in the Muslim Middle East, recent scholarship has brought into question the notion that the peaceful coexistence of Muslims, Jews, and Christians — known as the convivencia — could be defined as "pluralistic."^[4] Moreover, the appearance of Sufism on the Iberian peninsula is especially important because Sufism's "greatest shaykh," Ibn 'Arabi, was himself from Murcia.