The question of why 70,000 Moroccans migrated to the Spanish-governed territories of Ceuta and Melilla within hours on 30 July – ‘Throne Day’, which is one of the most respectable celebrations of the Morocco Kingdom – still lingers in international media and haunts inquisitive minds. Commentators have talked extensively about the socio-economic and geopolitical incentives, but the underreported in coverage seems to lie within the subjective semantics of hijra itself, the Arabic word for migration, its connotation in the Arabo-Islamic context, and therefore in the collective perception of the Arabs and/or Muslims, including Moroccans. The word hijra occurs twenty-four times … Continue reading Hijra: Movement, Migration, and Islamic Thought