CEUTA, Spain – Spain on Thursday deployed military units to reinforce police in the Spanish enclave of Ceuta in North Africa as migrants surged by sea and land from Morocco into the territory, and authorities sought to close off another Spanish enclave nearby. State television TVE reported that 2,000 to 3,000 people had crossed into Ceuta on Thursday. The report could not be immediately confirmed.

Video footage showed hundreds of migrants swimming or floating on inner tubes from the Moroccan side, and others breaking through a gate on land and running into the city.

In Fnideq, a Moroccan town just beyond the Ceuta border, Moroccan authorities aimed water cannons at migrants very late Thursday in an attempt to deter them from crossing, witnesses said.