Spain ceded Gibraltar in the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713. It wasn't stolen. Besides which, Spain isn't exactly innocent when it comes to "stealing a portion of a country and claiming it as theirs".

Spain disputes that the land the airport is on was covered by the Treaty of Utrecht.

Fair enough, I was wrong so deserve the downvotes.

Very few European countries are innocent when it comes to taking land that wasn’t theirs.

> Very few European countries are innocent when it comes to taking land that wasn’t theirs.

Very few any countries are.

That wasn't the important part of the response to your post though, the important part is that it wasn't stolen or conquered.

Gibraltar was ceded by treaty, and Spain has not one, but TWO exclaves along the Moroccan coast.

Like Ceuta?

Not only is that a tu quoque fallacy but it also fails to take into account that both Ceuta and Melilla are integral parts of Spain and have been since the 16th century, centuries prior to Morocco's independence from France in 1956, whereas Gibraltar, being a British Overseas Territory, is not and never has been part of the United Kingdom.

From Spain's perspective that's a distinction without a difference.

If sometime in the past 300 years the British government had formally incorporated Gibraltar into the UK the way Hawaii is a part of the US or French Guiana is part of France, would Spain's complaints about British sovereignty over Gibraltar, and periodic attempts to regain the territory, be any less frequent? I think not.

As long as we are talking (de)colonization, the distinction makes all the difference.

The difference in the treatment of a land and its people as equals to the rest of the country's citizens and states is what makes Hawaiians regular Americans and Ceuties regular Spaniards, and what keeps Llanitos from being British _citizens_.

To answer your question: yeah, if Gibraltar was a self-sufficient state within the UK (instead of an -arguably- geo-strategic colony that is a tax haven according to the OECD) you likely wouldn't hear as many complaints about it.

Take for example the cession of Sardinia in the very same Treaty of Utrecht. You ever hear complaints about its sovereignty?

You're saying that Spain wants Gibraltar back because it wants to liberate the benighted residents of the rock, which of course isn't true. Spain might claim as such as part of its overall case for regaining the territory, but that's certainly not the main, secondary, or tertiary reason.

If Sardinia were not an island hundreds of miles away, but a large peninsula physically connected to Spain, yes Spain would very much actively try to regain the territory. (Probably much more of a priority than Gibraltar.)

Gibraltar has the same status in OECD as USA, Germany, and is not classified as a tax haven. The regulation is the same as in any EU country, which Gibraltar was for a long time.

https://www.gibraltar.gov.gi/press-releases/gibraltar-retain...