Spain rocked by third night of violence as agitators ‘hunt immigrants’ after ‘Moroccan youths beat up old man for fun’

ANOTHER night of violence has rocked the Moroccan community in Torre Pacheco, in Murcia, with men dressed in black hunting North African immigrants.

The rioting in the San Antonio neighbourhood is a result of a photo that went viral of a 60-year-old resident, his face beaten up and bloody. Another video on TikTok showed a young man with a foreign accent allegedly assaulting the older resident.

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Although that incident is still under investigation, the street verdict is that a handful of Moroccan youths beat him up. On Friday, a handful of immigrant youths and youth from far-right groups clashed at a city council event condemning the original attacks. 

Three days of riots ensued, leaving several people arrested and several injured. The Civil Guard has deployed 75 officers in the municipality, and local police are roaming the streets.

“It’s the violence of frustrated children. Why don’t they study or work? These are children who are lost, but instead of addressing why they’re there, they’re singled out and persecuted,” a doctor told El País.

The immigrant grew up in the neighbourhood and has since left, but her entire family remains.

“I’m forbidding my nephews from going outside. But one of them is almost 19; how do you tell him not to go out? How do you demand that he stay locked up out of fear?” she says. 

Like her, some of the young people raised here have received an education and built successful careers.

But for many others, that hasn’t been an option. And they’ve ended up pushed out onto the streets, some involved in crime.

Mayor Pedro Ángel Roca, of the People’s Party (PP), supports the feeling of being fed up with crime, but claims there isn’t a lack of care and attention for young people in marginalised neighbourhoods. 

“In the end, nerves are triggered by a long period of crime,” he told El País. 

He believes the rise in crime can be attributed to the exponential increase in the town’s population, which has grown by almost 200% in recent decades—from 15,000 inhabitants to almost 42,000—driven mainly by immigrants who have come to work in the fields.

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EDITOR’S NOTE: The original version of this article claimed that the riots are ‘fuelled by racism’. We have removed this comment for its editorialising nature – the Olive Press strives just to report the news and to avoid expressing ideological positions.

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