Melilla is an autonomous city of Spain located in North Africa, sharing a border with Morocco. The city was founded by the Phoenicians as Rusadir, and, during the Roman Empire, Rusadir became a fortified town and port. Over the centuries, Rusadir came to be ruled by the Vandals, Byzantines, Moors, Moroccans, and, from 17 September 1497, by the Spanish, who conquered the city in the immediate aftermath of the Reconquista. Known to the Berbers as Mlilt, meaning "white one", the city became known to the Spanish as Melilla, and it continued to be a Spanish exclave for centuries. Melilla became known as a diverse city which was roughly half Muslim and half Christian, with a significant Sephardic Jewish population descended from Moroccan-Jewish refugees from Tetouan. In 1893, the Spanish defended Melilla against a Riffian assault, and the Spanish defeated Riffian revolts in 1909 and 1911. Abd el-Krim's revolt in the 1920s evolved into the infamous Rif War, which saw the Spanish suffer a devastating defeat at the 1921 Battle of Annual. Riffian pacos (snipers) harassed Melilla from Mount Gurugu until a joint Hispano-French expedition crushed the rebellion. In July 1936, Melilla was a staging ground for the fascist coup which led to the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War. Melilla, along with Ceuta, became a focus of Moroccan nationalism during the 20th century, and, in 2010, Eid al-Adha became the first non-Christian religious festival to be officially celebrated in Melilla since the Reconquista era. In 2018, Melilla had a population of 86,384 people, the majority of whom spoke Spanish; while the city was chiefly divided between Spaniards and Riffians, it was also home to sizable Jewish and Sindhi Hindu communities.
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