What does Assad’s downfall mean for the millions of Syrians displaced by war?

Syrian Kurdish families in Afrin region return to their villages on Dec. 5, 2024. (AFP)
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Updated 11 December 2024
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What does Assad’s downfall mean for the millions of Syrians displaced by war?

  • Jubilant after the fall of Assad, many displaced Syrians are eager to return home, despite destruction and political instability
  • UN refugee chief calls for ‘patience and vigilance’ as governments suspend Syrian asylum claims and consider deportations

LONDON: Although Syria remains in a precarious state just days after the fall of the regime of Bashar Assad, hundreds of displaced Syrians have flocked to border crossings in Lebanon and Turkiye, eager to return to their homeland after more than 13 grueling years of civil war.

At daybreak on Monday, scores of people gathered at the Cilvegozu and Oncupinar border gates in southern Turkiye and the Masnaa crossing in Lebanon, confident for the first time in years that they would not face arrest or conscription when they reached the other side.

On Sunday, in a historic moment for the Middle East, a coalition of armed opposition groups led by Hay’at Tahrir Al-Sham seized Damascus. Now a refugee himself, Assad fled the country and sought asylum in Russia, marking an inglorious end of his family’s brutal 54-year rule.

Syrians displaced across the Middle East, North Africa, Europe, and further afield by the years of fighting and persecution in their home country poured into the streets in celebration, jubilant that the uprising that began in 2011 had finally succeeded in dislodging Assad.




An aerial view shows long vehicle queues have formed on the roads leading to and from Damascus on December 8, 2024. (Getty Images)

Syria remains the world’s largest refugee crisis. Since the outbreak of civil war in 2011 following the regime’s brutal suppression of anti-government protests, the UN says more than 14 million Syrians have been forced to flee their homes.

While the majority sought refuge in other parts of Syria, including areas outside the regime’s control, others fled to neighboring countries — primarily Turkiye and Lebanon, but also Jordan, Egypt, and Iraq. Many more risked the perilous Mediterranean crossing to Europe.

Some 7.2 million Syrians remain internally displaced, where 70 percent of the population is deemed to require humanitarian assistance and where 90 percent live below the poverty line, according to the UN refugee agency, UNHCR.

More than 5 million Syrian refugees live in the five neighboring countries — Turkiye, Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq, and Egypt. Turkiye alone hosts around 3.2 million registered with the UNHCR, while Lebanon hosts at least 830,000.

Karam Shaar, a senior fellow at the Newlines Institute for Strategy and Policy, a nonpartisan Washington think tank, believes the first Syrians to return are likely “the most vulnerable,” such as those in Lebanon and in Turkiye, who have endured poverty and mounting hostility.

“In general, because of the situation in Lebanon and Turkiye being so bad, I think these people would be the most likely to come back,” Shaar told Arab News. “Many of them would be willing to go back to the rubble of their houses as long as Assad is not there because it just can’t get any worse.”

In Lebanon, anti-Syrian sentiment has grown significantly since the country was plunged into a debilitating economic crisis in 2019. There have even been cases of violence against members of the community and their property.

In April, Syrians were attacked and publicly humiliated in the streets of Byblos after a senior Lebanese Forces official, Pascal Suleiman, was reportedly killed by a Syrian gang during a botched carjacking.




On Monday, scores of people gathered at the Masnaa crossing in Lebanon. (AFP)

Compounding the plight of Syrians, the recent Israeli assault on Lebanon has displaced many families already struggling to survive, forcing them to live on the streets amid reports they have been denied access to municipal shelters.

Even before the outbreak of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah, displaced Syrians were subjected to restrictions on work and access to public services. Some 90 percent of them lived in extreme poverty, according to the UN.

Returning to Syria while Assad remained in power was out of the question for many. Before the regime’s downfall on Sunday, Human Rights Watch warned that Syrians fleeing Lebanon risked repression and persecution upon their return, including “enforced disappearance, torture, and death in detention.”

Indeed, the Syrian Network for Human Rights documented at least nine arrests of returnees prior to Oct. 2, most of which were reportedly linked to “mandatory and reserve” military conscription.




Syrian and Lebanese people celebrate the fall of the Syrian regime on December 8, 2024, in the northern Lebanese city of Tripoli. (AFP)

In Turkiye, Syrians have frequently been scapegoated by politicians. In July, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused opposition parties of fueling xenophobia and racism. His remarks came a day after anti-Syrian riots broke out in the Kayseri province after a Syrian refugee there was alleged to have sexually assaulted a 7-year-old Syrian girl.

A similar wave of violence erupted in an Ankara neighborhood in 2021 after a Turkish teenager was stabbed to death by a group of young Syrians. Hundreds of people took to the streets, vandalizing Syrian owned businesses.

Erdogan announced on Monday that Turkiye was opening its Yayladagi border gate with Syria to facilitate the safe and voluntary return of refugees, Reuters reported. Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said his country would support the return of Syrians to contribute to the reconstruction of the conflict-ravaged country.

“Those with families in Syria are eager to at least pay them a visit,” Marwah Morhly, a Turkiye-based media professional, told Arab News.

“Many are making plans to visit their hometowns with their children, who were born in Turkiye and have never been to Syria or met their relatives in person.”




Children walk in a camp for Syrian refugee in Turkiye set up by Turkish relief agency AFAD in the Islahiye district of Gaziantep on February 15, 2023. (AFP)

However, given the ongoing insecurity and political uncertainty in Syria, and the fact that many Syrians have built lives in Turkiye, the decision to return is not an easy one to make.

Morhly herself is hesitant about visiting, despite longing for her hometown of Damascus. “I can’t take a risk with a young child,” she said, referring to her son. Such a decision would depend on a Syrian-Turkish agreement on the refugee issue, she added.

UN High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said “there is a remarkable opportunity” for Syrians “to begin returning home.”

“But with the situation still uncertain, millions of refugees are carefully assessing how safe it is to do so. Some are eager, while others are hesitant,” he added in a statement on Monday.




Syrians in Turkiye celebrate the fall of Assad in Gaziantep, on December 8, 2024. (AFP)

Urging “patience and vigilance,” he expressed hope that refugees would be able to “make informed decisions” based on developments on the ground. Those decisions, he added, would depend on “whether the parties in Syria prioritize law and order.”

He stressed that “a transition that respects the rights, lives, and aspirations of all Syrians — regardless of ethnicity, religion, or political beliefs — is crucial for people to feel safe.”

UNHCR “will monitor developments, engage with refugee communities, and support states in any organized voluntary returns,” he added, pledging to “support Syrians wherever they are.”

Grandi also highlighted that “the needs within Syria remain immense,” as more than 13 years of war and economic sanctions had “shattered infrastructure.”




A photo taken from the Lebanese side of the northern border crossing of Al-Arida shows Syrian fighters assisting with the passage of Syrians back into their country on December 10, 2024. (AFP)

In Europe, home to at least 4.5 million Syrian refugees, several countries — including Austria, France, The Netherlands, Germany, Belgium, Greece, and the UK — announced they had halted Syrian asylum applications just hours after Assad’s fall.

Germany, which is home to the continent’s largest Syrian diaspora, was one of the first European countries to respond.

Nancy Faeser, Germany’s interior minister, said in a statement on Monday that the current “volatile situation” in Syria is the reason her country’s migration authority has paused asylum decisions, leaving thousands of Syrian applicants in limbo.

Austria has gone a step further, announcing plans to deport Syrian migrants. Interior Minister Gerhard Karner told Austrian media he has “instructed the ministry to prepare an orderly return and deportation program to Syria.

In The Netherlands, the government said it would stop assessing applications for six months. However, many are concerned it may also begin deportations.




Members of the Syrian community wave Syrian flags as celebrate on December 8, 2024 in Berlin, Germany. (AFP)

Discussions about sending refugees back to Syria amid such uncertainty have left many Syrians anxious about their future. This is particularly concerning for those who have built lives and established roots in their host countries.

Anti-refugee discourse has become increasingly common since the height of the European refugee crisis in 2015, when around 5.2 million people from conflict zones across Africa, Asia, and the Middle East arrived on European shores.

For many governments in Europe, the fall of the Assad regime could offer just the opportunity they were waiting for to show they are addressing public concerns about migration by removing thousands of Syrians.

But until Syria’s security situation stabilizes and its political future under its new de facto leadership becomes clearer, forced returns may be premature — or could even break international laws against refoulement should returnees come to harm.

Indeed, with the country still divided among rival factions, extremist groups like Daesh still at large, infrastructure in ruins, an economy crippled by sanctions, and uncertainty over the political agenda of the victorious HTS, Syria is by no means guaranteed peace and security.

 


Abbas risks Palestinian backlash over overhaul of prisoner payments

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Abbas risks Palestinian backlash over overhaul of prisoner payments

RAMALLAH: President Mahmoud Abbas faced criticism from allies and foes alike on Tuesday over a decree overhauling payments to families of Palestinians killed or jailed by Israel, a move to satisfy a US demand that will likely deepen his unpopularity.
Palestinian Authority leader Abbas, 89, issued the decree on Monday overturning the system, long condemned by critics as rewarding attacks on Israel but viewed among Palestinians as a vital source of welfare for detainees’ families.
The sudden announcement seems aimed at removing a potential source of tension with US President Donald Trump and an attempt to preserve the PA’s role as Washington bolsters its pro-Israeli approach to the conflict, Palestinian analysts said.
“The goal is to try to open a good page with Trump at a time when Trump has completely turned his back on the Palestinians by calling for displacement” of Palestinians from Gaza, said Hani Al-Masri, a Palestinian political analyst in Ramallah.
Scrapping the system of salary-type payments, dubbed “pay for slay” by critics — a label rejected by Palestinians — has been a major demand of successive US administrations. Abbas had long resisted pressure to halt the program.
The PA will instead provide support to families of prisoners via a social welfare network, according to need rather than their length of imprisonment. Qadura Fares, the Palestinian official responsible for prisoner affairs, said between 35,000 and 40,000 families would be affected.
Fares, a member of Abbas’ Fatah Movement, told a news conference “a fireball” had been thrown in Abbas’ lap, underlining the huge sensitivities of ending a system introduced under the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in the 1990s.
Hamas condemns move
Beneficiaries have included families in the Hamas-run Gaza Strip and Palestinians living in Lebanon, Syria and elsewhere — as well as those considered for release under the phased Gaza war ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas.
Israel’s foreign ministry dismissed the change as a ruse, saying payments would continue through other channels.
Masri said the public reaction would depend on how the move was implemented, saying that if payments to prisoners were totally scrapped, “it will be the straw that breaks the camel’s back.”
“This decision weakens the legitimacy and popularity of the president, which is already weak,” he added.
Palestinian opinion polls consistently show Abbas to be unpopular among Palestinians.
The Palestinian militant group Hamas condemned the decree saying it amounted to abandoning the cause “of the prisoners, the wounded, and the families of the martyrs” at a “critical juncture in the history of our Palestinian cause.”
The Ramallah-based Palestinian Authority, established under interim peace accords with Israel three decades ago, exercises limited self rule over patches of the Israeli-occupied West Bank.
The salaries and services it provides helped keep Abbas and his Fatah faction politically relevant in the face of expanding Israeli settlements and the political challenge posed by Hamas, which seized Gaza from Abbas’ control in 2007.
The decision comes as the PA faces mounting financial pressure from a slowdown in aid, a squeeze on a system of tax revenue transfers by Israel and a slump in contributions from Palestinians who have been shut out of the Israeli labor market by the war in Gaza.
Israel has been deducting the payments made by the authority from taxes collected on its behalf from goods that cross its territory to Palestinian areas.
The PA has appealed for more aid from Arab and European states to make up for the shortfall of billions of shekels but has so far struggled to make headway.

UAE president meets Pakistani PM ahead of World Governments Summit

Updated 3 min 32 sec ago
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UAE president meets Pakistani PM ahead of World Governments Summit

  • Leaders discuss cooperation on trade, need for peace between Israel, Palestine
  • Dubai hosting 3-day meeting of global leaders, innovators

LONDON: UAE President Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan welcomed Pakistani Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif on Tuesday ahead of the World Governments Summit.

During their talks, at Qasr Al-Shati in Abu Dhabi, the two leaders discussed ways to deepen cooperation and enhance ties between their countries in the economic, trade and development fields, the Emirates News Agency reported.

The meeting highlighted the summit’s role in identifying global governance trends and preparing governments to deal with global changes, the report said.

Al-Nahyan and Sharif also discussed regional and international issues, emphasizing the importance of lasting peace between Israel and Palestine through a two-state solution to ensure security and stability in the region.

Sharif reaffirmed Pakistan’s commitment to strengthening its relationship with the UAE and enhancing cooperation.

Abu Dhabi Crown Prince Sheikh Khaled bin Mohamed bin Zayed Al-Nahyan and his representative in the Al-Dhafra region, Sheikh Hamdan bin Zayed Al-Nahyan, also attended the meeting, along with other ministers and senior officials.


GCC ready for economy of ideas era, ministers tell summit

Updated 8 min 8 sec ago
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GCC ready for economy of ideas era, ministers tell summit

  • Saudi Economy Minister Faisal Alibrahim said that collaboration is essential among GCC member states and should not be seen as a weakness

DUBAI: Gulf Cooperation Council countries are taking substantial steps to diversify their economies based on a model of the economy of ideas, the World Governments Summit was told on Tuesday.

Multiple schemes and visions have been launched within the GCC, reflecting the region’s commitment to long-term economic diversification beyond the energy sector, economic ministers from the bloc said.

At the World Governments Summit 2025 annual meeting in Dubai, Saudi Economy Minister Faisal Alibrahim said that collaboration is essential among GCC member states and should not be seen as a weakness, but an opportunity.

“Economies such as logistics, healthcare and the new health tech, there’s agriculture, there’s agricultural tech, financial stocks and funds globally,” he added.

“It is important to recognize that GCC countries share common opportunities and challenges, so collaboration is key on both the regional and global levels. Integration should not be seen as a compromise, but a potential big opportunity on integration, on infrastructure and logistics policies,” said Albrahim.

Bahrain’s minister of finance and national economy, Salman Al-Khalifa, said: “Diversification means the need to reinvest, reinvent and lower our dependence on oil, nurture emerging sectors, but also to build new economic fields.”

Economic diversification has made the GCC resilient and boosted economic development, he added, highlighting that Saudi Arabia has made huge strides in that regard.

“Non-oil sectors made up 83 percent of Bahrain’s gross domestic product, and Bahrain is already investing in the future economy of human capital, technology and building a strong infrastructure for that, such as the first worldwide Data Sovereignty Law,” Al-Khalifa said.

“We are seeing great progress in non-oil sectors in the GCC; non-oil sectors now makes up 50 percent of the economy,” he added.

In the UAE, non-oil sectors now make up 74 percent of the economy and in Saudi Arabia, the figure stands at 70 percent, Al-Khalifa said.

The speakers highlighted the GCC’s falling reliance on oil and gas revenues by investing in renewable energy, technology and knowledge-based industries.

Discussions highlighted the need for sustainable economic policies that balance development with the preservation of natural resources for future generations.

GCC Secretary-General Jasem Al-Budaiwi said that the economy was a topic of discussion for everyone but the world was looking to the GCC for guidance.

“The world discovered a truth: We (the GCC) are, in fact, an economic entity. We are credible, we follow up on our word and as the GCC the world is listening to what we say, and following what we do,” he said.

Human capital is at the core of developing a sustainable economy in the GCC, Al-Khalifa said.

“First is the human capital. There is a need to make sure that the human capital we have in the GCC region is the finest human capital in global standards,” he added.

“The GCC has the most developed infrastructure, from the data center to telecom and cloud internet, and regulations are well suited for the economic transition from industrialized economies to an economy of ideas.

“There are many other examples, whether it is in fintech, whether it’s in logistics, whether it’s in technology, where governments can make a difference by exhausting the right set of regulations. So, those are the three things that we need to make sure that we’re always focused,” Al-Khalifa said.

IMF Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva said that deepening regional economic integration and pooling resources together makes the GCC more powerful and creates healthy competition in the region.

“Trade among GCC countries grew rapidly; good exports tripled in the last decade to $70 million,” she added.


Ceasefire is only way to bring Israeli hostages home, Hamas official says

A drone view shows Palestinian Hamas militants parading on the day some hostages held in Gaza were released as part of ceasefire
Updated 4 min 32 sec ago
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Ceasefire is only way to bring Israeli hostages home, Hamas official says

  • Trump said on Monday that Hamas should release all the hostages held by the group by midday on Saturday or he would propose canceling the Israel-Hamas ceasefire

CAIRO: A Hamas official said on Tuesday Israeli hostages can be brought home from Gaza only if a fragile ceasefire is respected, dismissing the “language of threats” after US President Donald Trump said he would “let hell break out” if they were not freed.
Hamas has begun releasing some hostages gradually but postponed freeing any more until further notice, accusing Israel of violating the terms with several deadly shootings as well as hold-ups of some aid deliveries in Gaza. Israel denies holding back aid supplies and says it has fired on people who disregard warnings not to approach Israeli troop positions.
Trump, a close ally of Israel, said on Monday that Hamas should release all the hostages held by the Palestinian militant group by midday on Saturday or he would propose canceling the Israel-Hamas ceasefire, which took effect on January 19.
Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel remained determined to get all the hostages back.
“We will continue to take determined and ruthless action until we return all of our hostages — the living and the deceased,” he said in a statement mourning Israeli Shlomo Mansour after the military confirmed he was killed during the Hamas attack on October 7, 2023, that triggered the Gaza war.
Ahon Ohel, an Israeli still held hostage in Gaza nearly 500 days after gunmen seized him from a roadside bomb shelter in southern Israel, managed to get a message out from the Gaza tunnel where he was in captivity.
He sent a birthday wish for his sister via two other hostages who had been held with him and were freed on Saturday, his mother Idit Ohel said.
“Alon has been in the tunnels all this time,” Ohel told Reuters in an interview. “(He) hasn’t seen sunlight, doesn’t know the difference between day and night, has gotten little food — about one (piece of) bread a day.”
Trump has enraged Palestinians and Arab leaders and upended decades of US policy that endorsed a possible two-state solution in the region by trying to impose his vision of Gaza, which has been devastated by an Israeli military offensive and is short of food, water and shelter, and in need of foreign aid.
“Trump must remember there is an agreement that must be respected by both parties, and this is the only way to bring back the (Israeli) prisoners. The language of threats has no value and only complicates matters,” senior Hamas official Sami Abu Zuhri told Reuters.
Trump has said the United States should take over Gaza — where many homes have been reduced to piles of cement, dust and twisted metal after 15 months of war — and move out its more than 2 million residents so that the Palestinian enclave can be turned into the “Riviera of the Middle East.”
Trump was to meet Jordan’s King Abdullah on Tuesday for what is likely to be a tense encounter over the president’s Gaza redevelopment idea, including a threat to cut aid to the US-allied Arab country if it refuses to resettle Palestinians.
The forcible displacement of a population under military occupation is a war crime banned by the 1949 Geneva conventions.
Palestinians fear a repeat of what they call the Nakba, or catastrophe, when hundreds of thousands of Palestinians fled or were driven out during the 1948 war that accompanied Israel’s creation. Israel denies they were forced out.
“We have to issue an ultimatum to Hamas. Cut off electricity and water, stop humanitarian aid. To open the gates of hell,” far-right Israeli Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich told a conference of the Institute for Ultra-Orthodox Strategy and Policy.
UN chief warns of “immense tragedy”
The Gaza war has been paused since January 19 under the ceasefire agreement between Israel and Hamas that was brokered by Qatar and Egypt with support from the United States.
More than 48,000 Palestinians have been killed in the war, the Gaza health ministry says, and nearly all of Gaza’s 2.3 million population has been internally displaced by the conflict, which has caused a hunger crisis.
Some 1,200 people were killed in the October 7, 2023 Hamas-led attack on southern Israeli communities and about 250 were taken to Gaza as hostages, Israeli tallies show.
Trump’s ideas, which include a threat to cut aid to Egypt if it does not take in Palestinians, have introduced new complexity into a sensitive and explosive Middle East dynamic, including the shaky ceasefire between Israel and Hamas.
For Jordan, Trump’s talk of resettling some 2 million Gazans comes dangerously close to its nightmare of a mass expulsion of Palestinians from both Gaza and the West Bank, echoing a vision of Jordan as an alternative Palestinian home that has long been propagated by ultra-nationalist Israelis.
Amman’s concern is being amplified by a surge in violence on its border with the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where Palestinian hopes of statehood are being rapidly eroded by expanding Jewish settlement.
United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said on X on Tuesday that a resumption of armed conflict should be avoided at all costs because that would lead to “immense tragedy.”
“I appeal to Hamas to proceed with the planned liberation of hostages. Both sides must fully abide by their commitments in the ceasefire agreement and resume serious negotiations.”
The idea of a Palestinian state and Israel coexisting in peace has faded since 2014 when Palestinian and Israeli attempts at peacemaking in one of the most volatile and violent regions of the world stalled.


IMF committed to financing MENA countries needing support with $33 billion funding

Updated 42 min 50 sec ago
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IMF committed to financing MENA countries needing support with $33 billion funding

  • IMF commits $33 billion support to MENA countries most in need

DUBAI: The International Monetary Fund remains committed to helping countries that need support in the MENA region with financing of $33 billion, IMF’s Managing Director Kristalina Georgieva told the World Government Summit on Tuesday.

“Today the IMF is supporting over 50 vulnerable countries, half of them are in sub-Saharan Africa … more important is we help countries build the foundations to get on a better part,” Georgieva told the WGS during a session with Richard Quest, CNN correspondent and anchor.

“By the way, in this region, $33 billion, IMF is financing for countries that need that support,” she said.

When asked by Quest if she was concerned that inflation was going to resurge, the IMF’s top official said that there was a need to see how things evolved.

“If we are in a situation where in some parts of the world there is a slowdown that may push central banks to bring interest rates down, that actually may not be inflationary … there are many things that we don’t know, but what we do know is that we have a situation in which the US economy has been performing quite strongly and will likely continue to be strong and that pushes the dollar up,” Georgieva explained.

Addressing a packed hall during WGS’s first day, the IMF chief added that the US had outperformed the rest of the G20 members; the only economy to exceed its pre-pandemic trend.

“What does that mean? Capital is moving much more forcefully toward the US … before the pandemic many on the move went to many places, 18 percent went to the United States and today it is over 30 percent.

“So that is the foundation for a strong dollar, and a strong dollar all other things are equal for the majority of emerging markets and developing economies is trouble … so then we have inflationary impact,” she said.

The IMF sees a picture of a “remarkably resilient world economy despite a series of unprecedented shocks,” Georgieva said, elaborating that “we are projecting growth this year 3.3 percent and next year 3.3 percent.”

The Gulf countries were doing quite well, she said, but expressed more concern about “Europe, and some ... (places) are vulnerable emerging markets where they are doing less well.”

Another concern highlighted was “how the tremendous transformations that are happening in the world are integrated in countries’ policies.”

Taking AI as a case in point, Quest asked: “Do you see us having a good handle on the growth of new technologies?”

“So, we look at the front, what is happening with artificial intelligence? It can be a great story, a world that becomes more productive, or it can be a sad story, a world that is more divided … the haves have more, and the have-nots are completely lost.

“What we assess is that AI is already like a tsunami hitting the labor market in advanced economies … 60 percent of jobs over the next period of time will either enhance and become more productive, or transformed or eliminated,” she said. 

Georgieva added that there was a need to recognize that “we are in a multipolar world” so cooperation as it used to be “before when we had a world with one country dominating” was going to be different.

“We still have one economy that is the strongest (the US) but we also have many economies, emerging market economies that are moving forward much faster, usually because of the 3 Ds; deregulate, digitize and diversify. These islands of excellence need to connect more, and we at the IMF are actually promoting more inter-region and cross-region collaboration. I think it is a moment to recognize our host (the UAE) because they are absolutely fantastic in working with everybody,” she said.