Violent demonstrations against Spanish rule broke out in Ifni in April 1957, and in October Moroccan militias began converging near the territory.

Hostilities ceased in April 1958 (although small skirmishes still occurred) with the Treaty of Angra de Cintra, signed by the Spanish and Moroccan governments, by which Cape Juby and most of the Ifni territory were transferred to Morocco.

[9] The following decades of Franco-Spanish collaboration resulted in the establishment and extension of the Spanish protectorate south of the city in Cape Juby.

Sultan Mohammed V encouraged efforts to re-capture the land and personally funded anti-Spanish guerillas to claim Ifni back for Morocco.

[10] Violent demonstrations against Spanish rule erupted in Ifni on 10 April 1957, followed by civil strife and widespread killings of those loyal to Spain.

At Tiliuín [es], 60 Tiradores de Ifni (locally recruited indigenous infantry with Spanish officers and specialist personnel) struggled to hold off a force of several hundred Moroccans.

Leaving Sidi Ifni on 24 November aboard several old trucks, a platoon of the Spanish Legion paratroop battalion under Captain Ortiz de Zárate made slow progress through difficult terrain.

In the space of a fortnight, the Moroccans and their tribal allies had asserted control over most of Ifni, isolating inland Spanish units from the capital.

Consequently, Moroccan units, resupplied and greatly reinforced, tried to surround and besiege Sidi Ifni, hoping to incite a popular uprising.

Supplied from the sea by the Spanish Navy and protected by kilometres of trenches and forward outposts, Sidi Ifni, boasting 7,500 defenders by 9 December, proved impregnable.

On 10 February, the 4th, 9th, and 13th Spanish Legion battalions, organised into a motorised group, drove the Moroccans from Edchera and advanced to Tafurdat and Smara.

On 2 April 1958, the governments of Spain and Morocco signed the Treaty of Angra de Cintra which was named after the large bay in the area.

[14] Spain retained possession of Sidi Ifni until 1969, when, while under some international pressure (resolution 2072 of the United Nations from 1965), it returned the territory to Morocco.