Under Visigothic rule Spain was filled with extreme instability due to lack of communication between the native Spaniards and the new rulers, who followed the Germanic notion of kingship.

Several historical sources state that the Islamic caliphate had not actually targeted the Visigothic Kingdom for conquest, but political divisions within it created an opportunity which was successfully exploited by an army which was led by the Muslim general Tariq ibn-Ziyad.

One name frequently mentioned is Count Julian of Ceuta who invited Tariq ibn-Ziyad to invade southern Spain because his daughter had been raped by King Roderick.

On April 30, 711, Muslim General Tariq ibn-Ziyad landed at Gibraltar and by the end of the campaign most of the Iberian Peninsula (except for small areas in the north-west such as Asturias and the Basque territory) were brought under Islamic rule.

Muslim forces attempted to move north-east across the Pyrenees Mountains toward France, but were defeated by the Frankish Christian Charles Martel at the Battle of Tours in 732.

One of the reasons for such great success under this empire was the legal terms offered to the public, which differed from the conditions which were implemented by the Visigoth kingdom which preceded it.

"[13] The Muslim rulers of Spain "relied on the Jews for diplomacy and public administration who were inaugurated into posts of commerce and played important roles in cities such as Toledo and Cordoba".

[12] In addition, in regard to Jews and Christians in Andalusia, "one 11th-century legal text called them members of "the devil's party" and they "were subject to special taxes and, often, dress codes".

[12] Many scholars believe that this more benign view of convivencia "masks the very presence of institutional fundamentalism in medieval Spain – both its Jewish and Muslim manifestations in the nature of forced conversions, exile, lower standards of citizenship, higher taxation and violence".

[14] In time Islamic migrants from places as diverse as North Africa to Yemen and Syria and Iran invaded territories in the Iberian peninsula.

The Reconquista (Reconquest) was the process by which the Catholic Kingdoms of northern Spain eventually managed to succeed in defeating and conquering the Muslim states of the Iberian Peninsula.

After the battle of Las Navas de Tolosa in 1212, most of Al-Andalus fell under control of the Catholic kingdoms, the only exception being the Nasrid dynasty Emirate of Granada.

This continued when Archbishop Talavera was replaced by the intolerant Cardinal Cisneros, who immediately organised a drive for mass forced conversions and burned publicly thousands of Arabic books (manuscripts).

[17] Outraged by this breach of faith, in 1499 the Mudéjars rose in the First Rebellion of the Alpujarras, which was unsuccessful and only had the effect of giving Ferdinand and Isabella a pretext to revoke the promise of toleration.

In 1567, King Philip II finally made the use of the Arabic language illegal, and forbade the Islamic religion, dress, and customs, a step which led to the Second Rebellion of Alpujarras, involving acts of brutality from the Muslim rebels, against Christian locals.

Unlike the Kingdom of Aragon and Valencia, Moriscos were highly integrated in the rest of Spain significant number of them avoided expulsion or returned en masse, with the protection of non-morisco neighbours and local authorities.

However, in relation to the overall population within the Autonomous Communities, the cities of Ceuta and Melilla stand out with the highest percentages of Muslims, following the Region of Murcia, Catalonia, and La Rioja.

In “Others” we can find the following countries: Mauritania (8,165), Syria (7,321), Cameroon (6,232), Iran (5,913), Turkey (5,000), Guinea-Bissau (4,413), Ivory Coast (4,249), Egypt (4,020), Albania (3,004), Kazakhstan (2,438), Tunisia (2,287), Lebanon (2,116), Indonesia (1,764), Iraq (1,554), Jordan (1,315), Burkina Faso (1,276), Saudi Arabia (745), Sierra Leone (685), Togo (451), Benin (338).

Since the signature of the Cooperation Agreement between the State and the Islamic Commission of Spain in 1992 and the increase of migratory flows, there has been a significant growth of organisations in form of religious communities, associations, and federations.

The Constitution of 1978 stipulated in Article 16 that all beliefs within the Spanish society will be taken into account and the state will maintain cooperative relations with the Catholic Church as well as with other religious denominations.

[36] Furthermore, The Organic Law of Religious Liberty (LOLR) of 1980 specified in Article 7 that the state should establish Cooperation Agreements with those “Churches, Confessions and Communities” that had achieved 'deep-rootedness' (Notorio arraigo) in Spanish society, due to their scope and the number of believers.

[37] The criteria were the following ones:[38] This law allowed the state to sign Cooperation Agreements with the Jewish, the Evangelic and the Muslim communities, which were previously recognised as "deep-rooted" religions.

[39] In 1984, the Advisory Commission of Religious Liberty (CARL), an administrative organ within the Ministry of Justice, recognised both the Evangelic and the Jewish confessions, and in 1989 the Islamic religion achieved his recognition as well.

[43] 1992 was chosen as the year for the signature of the Cooperation Agreements, due to the 500th anniversary regarding the conquest of the Nasrid Kingdom of Granada and the Expulsion of Jews from Spain.

[44] Nevertheless, the agreements aimed to equate the one signed with the Catholic Church and so to accommodate the religions mentioned within public institutions and the school system, to guarantee the exemption from taxation and the involvement of the religious communities in the preservation of their related cultural heritage.

Moreover, since Spain is a semi-federal state, the competencies over the agreed measures correspond to different administrative levels: the Central Government, the Autonomous Communities, and the Municipal councils.

Regarding the regulatory framework, the Spanish government signed an agreement about the designation and economic regime of the Islamic religion teachers that went into effect for the 1996–1997 school year.

While Navarre, Galicia, and Asturias opened the opportunity to take the subject if the requirements are fulfilled, the Region of Murcia has not yet answered the petitions of the Islamic Commission of Spain.

[59] The Cooperation Agreement established fiscal benefits and tax exemptions for the Islamic religious communities but did not stipulate a financial mechanism similar to the one for the Catholic Church.

[72] In December 2004, the Foundation for Pluralism and Coexistence (FPC) was created to support programmes related to cultural, educative, and social integration for those religions with "deep-rootedness", i.e. the Evangelic Church, Judaism, and Islam.