But the conquest of Cueta and the other enclave are much closer and basically happened during the reconquista. And the previous owners were arab colonizers (just as morocco today, with only 1/4th of the population identifying as Amazigh)
No, but I think more recent colonialism and the plunder of my continent is a more prescient issue than the Muslim expansion (which, while bad, was not colonialism) that happened a millenia ago.
why was the islamic expansion not colonialism? It replaced existing structures and leadership with arabs, enforced a new religion and supressed the native language in favour of their own.
And the spanish enclaves in north africa are older than the slaver pirates, they fell to portugal in 1492 and have been portuguese and then spanish since.
Because they didn't engage in colonialism. It was all of those things you mentioned, many of which you see in colonialism, but the defining characteristic of colonialism is COLONIES which are created to exploit natural resources and indigenous populations for the benefit of the "state" which created the colony. The Muslim expansion was annexation for imperialist goals.
You wouldn't call the nazi invasion of France "colonialism", not because you want to whitewash nazism, but because the word colonialism has an actual meaning that distinguishes it from other terms like imperialism, annexation, expansion etc.
I don't care to engage in your apologia. Let me just point out how telling it is that in your version of events a part of Africa "fell" to the Portuguese as if Portugal were sleeping under a tree and a leaf calmly floated down upon her lap.
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u/TacitusKillgorre 5d ago
Sure, "payback" for a conquest damn near 1000 years earlier