How many Syrians have returned home one year since the fall of al-Assad? | Syria’s War News

December 8 marks one yr because the al-Assad dynasty, which lasted 54 years, was faraway from energy by a insurgent offensive.

The 14-year-long battle led to one of many world’s largest migration crises, with some 6.8 million Syrians, a few third of the inhabitants, fleeing the nation on the battle’s peak in 2021, in search of refuge wherever they may discover it.

Greater than half of those refugees, about 3.74 million, settled in neighbouring Turkiye, whereas 840,000 discovered refuge in Lebanon and 672,000 in Jordan.

The animation beneath reveals the variety of Syrian refugees who fled from 2011 to 2025, highlighting the highest 10 nations that hosted them.

Now, as Syria is getting into a brand new chapter, tens of millions of refugees and members of the diaspora are weighing the choice to return residence and rebuild their lives.

‘The sensation of belonging’

Khalid al-Shatta, a 41-year-old administration administration skilled from Damascus, determined to return to Syria after fleeing the nation in September 2012.

Al-Shatta, alongside along with his spouse and one-year-old son, first fled to Jordan by automotive earlier than flying to Turkiye, which turned their non permanent residence.

Al-Shatta recollects the anticipation surrounding al-Assad’s fall. On the evening it occurred, he mentioned, everybody stayed as much as watch the information.

“The second Syria was liberated, we made our resolution,” he advised Al Jazeera. “My household and I got here to the conclusion that we’ve got to return to Syria, and be a part of its future,” he defined.

Al-Shatta describes returning to Syria for the primary time in 13 years and feeling “like I’ve by no means left Syria earlier than, with one distinction, the sensation of belonging to this nation, to this nation, this land”.

What number of Syrians have returned from overseas?

Al-Shatta and his household are among the many greater than 782,000 Syrians documented by the Worldwide Group for Migration (IOM) who’ve returned to Syria from different nations over the previous yr.

Of those that have arrived from overseas, 170,000 have returned to Aleppo, 134,000 to Homs and 124,000 to rural Damascus.

Since returning to Damascus, al-Shatta has opened his personal enterprise, targeted on energy options. Nevertheless, he says many returnees are struggling to seek out work with appropriate salaries.

“Syria isn’t low-cost [to live] in contrast with the common salaries; there are job alternatives, but the salaries are difficult,” he says.

He explains how the standard of life varies drastically for Syria’s inhabitants, which now stands at 26.9 million. “Some households live on $150 to $200 per thirty days, whereas others dwell on $1,500 to $2,000, and a few earn much more,” he explains.

Regardless of the rise in returns, restricted job alternatives and excessive dwelling prices proceed to undermine long-term resettling. Housing stays unaffordable for a lot of, leaving returnees in broken houses or costly rental models.

In response to the IOM, whereas 69 p.c of Syrians nonetheless personal their property, 19 p.c are renting, 11 p.c are being hosted at no cost, and 1 p.c are squatting.

New EU asylum pointers

Within the days following the autumn of al-Assad, a number of European nations – together with Austria, Belgium, Denmark, Germany, Greece, Italy, Sweden, and the UK – introduced plans to pause asylum functions from Syrians.

The freeze utilized to each new functions and people already in course of, leaving many Syrians in limbo about whether or not they can be accepted, rejected or deported.

As of mid-2025, whole asylum functions throughout the EU+ – European Union nations plus Norway and Switzerland – fell by 23 p.c in contrast with the primary half of 2024.

The decline was pushed primarily by a steep drop in Syrian functions. Syrians lodged about 25,000 functions within the first half of 2025, a two-thirds lower from a yr earlier.

For the primary time in additional than a decade, Syrians are not the biggest nationality group in search of asylum in Europe.

On December 3, the EU issued up to date steerage for Syrian asylum candidates, saying opponents of al-Assad and navy service evaders “are not susceptible to persecution”.

Between 2012 and June 2025, EU+ states granted refugee standing to roughly 705,000 Syrian candidates, in response to the European asylum company.

Returning to ‘destroyed and demolished’ houses

Along with the 782,000 Syrians coming back from overseas, the IOM has documented practically 1.8 million internally displaced Syrians returning to their cities over the previous yr.

This brings the overall variety of Syrian refugees and IDPs who’ve returned residence over the previous yr to 2.6 million. Of these internally displaced, 471,000 have returned to Aleppo, practically 460,000 to Idlib, and 314,000 to Hama.

Talal Nader al-Abdo, 42, from Maaret al-Numan in southern Idlib, was one of many internally displaced Syrians who returned residence from a tent the place he and his household had been dwelling.

“I used to be one of many victims of [Bashar al-Assad’s] brutality,” al-Abdo advised Al Jazeera.

His household had been internally displaced a number of occasions, first from Maaret al-Numan, then to Ariha, then to Idlib, and eventually to the border camps Kafr Jalis and Harbanoush of northern Syria, the place al-Abdo recollects the cruel days they spent within the excessive chilly and intense warmth.

“When the regime fell, I knew that reduction had come, the bombing had ended, and the time was close to for us to return to our houses, regardless that they had been destroyed and demolished. We might return and rebuild them,” al-Abdo added.

All through the battle, al-Abdo, collectively along with his spouse, three sons, daughter, and aged mom, stayed in northwestern Syria “as a result of we had nice religion that someday God would grant us reduction and we might return residence”.

Regardless of many returning residence, there are nonetheless greater than six million Syrians who stay internally displaced, in response to the IOM.

The most important share of these live in rural Damascus (1.99 million), adopted by Aleppo (1.33 million) and Idlib (993,000).