As Assad’s isolation is lifted, Syrian refugees fear pressure to return home

Early one morning recently, Lebanese soldiers marched through the Bourj Hammoud neighborhood of Beirut, clearing two buildings of the Syrian refugees living in them. They forced them into trucks and drove them into a no man’s land between the Lebanese and Syrian borders.

After being trapped at the border for days, hundreds of refugees were returned to Syria by Syrian forces. Among them was Rasha, a 34-year-old mother of three who fled the country in 2011. The family spent their first night back in Syria sleeping on the streets of the capital Damascus. The next day, she said, she paid a smuggler to help them get back to Lebanon.

If the soldiers ever return, Rasha promised, she would die before being forced back into Syria.

“Even if they shoot me, I’m not going back,” she said after returning to her home in Beirut, where her family, especially her 12-year-old son, live in fear that the soldiers will return. “My son keeps waking up in the middle of the night screaming, ‘Mommy, they’ve come,'” said Rasha, who asked to be called by her first name for security reasons.

Across the Middle East, Syrian refugees like Rasha, who fled their country by the millions during its 12-year war, have watched nervously as the Arab world has broken diplomatic relations with their country’s authoritarian leader, President, after more than a decade. Bashar al-Assad, recovering from isolation in the Middle East and beyond.

Last month, Mr. al-Assad is attending the annual Arab League summit for the first time in 13 years, and many of the countries welcoming him back have made the return of Syrian refugees a top priority.

“We are all interested in Syrian refugees returning safely to their homes,” Saudi Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan said at the end of the summit hosted by his country. “We will work with the government in Damascus to make that happen.”

Despite assurances of safe returns to Syria by countries hosting refugees, human rights groups have said it is not safe for them to return and some of those who have done so have faced arbitrary detention, disappearance, torture and even extrajudicial killings .

More than six million Syrians fled during the conflict that began in 2011, with most settling in neighboring countries such as Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan. For many, the re-establishment of normal diplomatic relations with the Syrian government presents the terrifying prospect of losing safe havens and being forced to give up the new life they have struggled to build.

Rights organizations such as Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have been warning for years about the dangers of sending Syrians home, especially to areas under government control where those who have fled compulsory military service or who have spoken out against the regime are at risk of disappearing into a notorious prison system where torture and murder are rife.

International law prohibits the return of people to a place where they are at risk of persecution or other serious human rights violations.

While Arab leaders are talking about safe and voluntary returns, the discussions have already sparked panic among some Syrian populations, said Dareen Khalifa, a Syria expert with the International Crisis Group.

“It certainly doesn’t mean the voluntary and safe return,” said Ms. Khalifa. “It’s all code to turn people back in any way or make it very difficult for them to stay.”

In Lebanon, where some 1.5 million Syrians have taken refuge, security forces have been carrying out deportation raids for months. According to the United Nations, they have returned more than 1,700 Syrian refugees to a country that is still at war and largely ruled by a repressive government.

Both Lebanon and Turkey have previously deported Syrians. But human rights groups say greater numbers are now being deported from Lebanon and it is happening more systematically.

Lebanon — a country of only about four million people when the Syrian war began — immediately felt the pressure of the influx of Syrians. Syrian refugees were initially warmly welcomed in Turkey and Jordan. But Lebanon has not set up formal refugee camps for them and has enacted restrictive labor laws that limited the work Syrians could do.

In April, when Rasha and her neighbors were deported, they slept for five days in an abandoned hall once used for weddings before being taken to Syria. According to Rasha, who witnessed the arrests, dozens of men were arrested – some wanted for opposing the Assad government or for evading military service.

In a recent survey of Syrian refugees conducted by the United Nations Refugee Agency, only 1.1 percent of respondents said they plan to return to Syria next year. Only 56 percent said they hope to ever return to Syria.

In Turkey, where more than 3.3 million Syrian refugees live, returning Syrians became a major issue in the recent elections. In the days before the May 28 presidential election, Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the opposition leader who challenged incumbent President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, posted billboards reading “Syrians will go!”

Although Erdogan won re-election, the strong showing of far-right nationalists in May’s presidential and parliamentary elections could push Turkish government policy towards a tougher course. In his acceptance speech, Erdogan promised that his government would ensure the voluntary return of one million Syrians within a year.

Ahmad, a 26-year-old Syrian living in Istanbul, said the Turkish authorities sent him back to Syria in January after spending five months in a camp for those about to be deported. Five days later, he said, he paid a smuggler to take him back to Turkey.

When he first came to Turkey in 2021, he applied for a temporary identity card, which Turkey gives to refugees. But after going through the process, he was told that Turkey no longer issued them.

“I am gripped by fear. When I’m working in the shop and it’s getting late, I’d rather sleep in the mechanic’s workshop than risk it and walk home,” said Ahmad, who asked to be identified by his first name only for security reasons. “What if I get caught and locked up and deported again?”

Jordan, which has more than 650,000 registered Syrian refugees, has been one of the leading supporters of a plan to send refugees home there.

On May 1, Jordan hosted Arab foreign ministers from five states, including Saudi Arabia and Egypt, to discuss what they would require from Syria in return for normalizing relations with Mr al-Assad. A statement issued from the meeting mentioned a pilot program to return 1,000 Syrians – a way of testing the waters for the return of larger numbers.

Lebanese soldiers turned up at the home of another Syrian refugee, Najib, in April and deported him, his wife and their two young children to Syria, according to his brother Mohammed.

Najib, 31, had defected from the Syrian army in the early days of the conflict and was wanted by the government, said his brother, who asked that both be called by their first names for security reasons.

Najib was handed over to Syrian security forces and, more than a month later, his family is still unsure of his whereabouts.

Mohammed, who works as a tailor in Beirut, said he was often too scared to leave his house lest he face eviction himself. He now spends his time tracking down information about his brother.

A mediator has asked the family for $5,000 to help free his brother and smuggle him back to Lebanon, he said.

“I heard from the Arab League that there is a plan to send us back to Syria,” he said. “But what are the guarantees? My brother is still missing. How can I guarantee that I will not face my brother’s fate?”

Vivian Nereim contributed reporting from Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.