When considering Syria, the world should be patient

Syria is a mix of hope and fragility. Its people, including those separated and exiled from their homes for so long, are rightly celebrating the end of a 14-year brutal conflict that killed so many and ruined countless lives.

The war that wrought so much destruction has left Syria barely able to function. What we need now is a mix of patience and generous assistance so Syria can get back on its feet and avoid a reversion to more chaos and difficulty.

When I visited Syria in mid-December, the joy was palpable. You could sense the gratitude and tentative optimism that the millions of people who have suffered would finally get the chance to chart a future that includes peace, stability and security.

Yet in the eyes of the people I spoke with, I could also sense apprehension, a worry that is entirely understandable. Even before the fall of the prior regime, nearly 17 million people in Syria needed humanitarian assistance, 4.2 million in the northwest alone.

And now, fully into winter, about 600,000 people are newly displaced from homes. The economy, reliant on cash, is in shambles. Supply chains are very dysfunctional, commercial activities have been disrupted, and critical services are barely present.

Everyone in Syria feels the impact. Getting access to even the basic essentials is difficult and few can afford much more than that: about 90% of Syrians live in poverty.

Even those with professional backgrounds are suffering. A young resident doctor at a public hospital told me she had to take on other work because she could not get by on her salary of the equivalent of $50 (€47.9) a month.

The humanitarian infrastructure in Syria is at its limits, overstretched and severely underfunded. It is weighed down by barriers put in by the al-Assad regime that prevented assessing the needs and getting access to delivering help.

Allow reconstruction and assuage fears

Immediately, the priority for the international community should be delivering significant assistance. The most vulnerable, including those displaced, along with host communities and returnees, need food, water, hygiene and sanitation and other essential items.

Nations should also consider exempting Syria from long-imposed sanctions, especially to allow development and reconstruction efforts to begin. Even as humanitarian assistance increases, the redevelopment process that is key to Syria’s future needs to begin soon.

Donor countries now hosting large Syrian communities should focus their development aid to help rebuild the neighborhoods to which these Syrians would return, and they should enable the Syrian communities to be part of these rebuilding efforts.

To reassure the international community, the caretaker government should follow through on its early signals that it favours a pluralistic society that respects the rule of law — including housing, land and property rights, and the human rights of all.

This would alleviate the concerns of some Syrians who have crossed into Lebanon out of fear of what might happen to them. The caretaker government must take steps to reassure these groups.

And at this critical time, nearby nations such as Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt and Türkiye — who Syrian refugees relied on during the war — can play key roles of assistance and support to help ensure Syria and its people have the chance at lasting peace. However, these countries need ongoing financial support to sustain the provision of such critical assistance.

The caretaker government and the international community should also be getting the input of the Syrian diaspora, people who have the most to gain from the stability and security of their country.

Some of the diaspora have already gone back home, and others are considering returning to support the transition and reconstruction. The right to go back to one’s home has always been sacrosanct and should remain so.

But that does not mean Syria is ready to manage a large-scale return of the Syrians who have been living as refugees or awaiting asylum claims in Europe and neighbouring countries.

Syrians deserve our support and our patience

Sending millions of people back to Syria, as some have suggested, risks ripping apart the still-new stitches that are binding this proud nation’s wounds. The frail public, government and economic infrastructure cannot support that scale of returns, and such a plan could increase chaos and eventually lead to more migration away from Syria.

The Syrians living elsewhere need something to come back to: schools that can educate, hospitals and medical facilities that can care for people, businesses that can buy and sell and employ.

That’s why investing in education and healthcare, along with other community development work, will be essential. The Syrians who want to go home need to know that when they do, they are making the right decision to go home for good.

They need to know where their children will go to school. They need to know if their home is still there and if it is safe to be in their former community — large parts of the country, for example, are riddled with cluster munitions, missiles, landmines, grenades and other deadly explosive ordinance.

We are hearing that Syrians in neighbouring countries want to make "go-and-see visits," and we advocate for all asylum countries to allow that to happen. However, they need an enabling environment that allows them to do that in safe and secure way.

Syria should be able to approach its future with careful and inclusive steps, backed by plenty of international assistance.

The international community has a vested interest in Syria’s success and its potential to be an anchor for a more peaceful, stable Middle Eastern region, one in which people want to move to rather than have to move from.

Yet bringing that era into a reality requires a collaborative approach, careful planning and a long-term commitment.

Syrians are starting to trade, to mend, to plan. They deserve our support and our patience.

Amy Pope is Director General of the International Organization for Migration (IOM).