Every night for half of her life, Ghena Ali Mostafa has spent the moments before sleep wondering what she would do first if she had the chance to step back into the Syrian home she fled as daughter. She imagined herself lying down and pressing her lips to the ground, and melting into a hug from the grandmother she left behind. She thought of her father, who disappeared when she was 13.
All of this was beyond the realm of possibility as her teens and early 20s struggled with her past. Then, after rebels overthrew Bashar al-Assad's brutal regime, those thoughts of home fell back within reach.
“Today I have a country that I can go back and build. Today I don't have to be a refugee anymore,” Mostafa said in an interview from her apartment in Toronto on Monday.
“Today I have a home and this home is waiting for me.”
Mostafa, 24, is among an unknown number of Syrian refugees considering returning to Syria after the fall of the Assad regime on Sunday ended 13 years of civil war and decades more under his family's violent dictatorship. .
Elated families say they are relishing their first tangible hope of going home, but the director of a Canadian aid foundation says they are also watching closely to see where the political situation, economic and humanitarian of the country goes from here.
'I'm happier'
Mostafa left Syria with her sister and mother for their own safety after her father, who had rebelled against the regime, “forcefully disappeared” with them with thousands of other government opponents in 2013. The three women lived as refugees in Turkey and Jordan before moving to Canada in 2018.
They are still doing “everything” to find out what happened to his father and she still has family in Syria. Mostafa called them this weekend and heard them speak freely, without fear, for the first time since she left.
“I never thought I'd see this moment in my 20s. I thought that maybe my children or maybe my grandmothers will see this moment. I hope I can get back with my father,” she said, shaking visibly.
“I'm happier and more distant.”
More than six million Syrians became refugees during a decade of civil war, according to the United Nations. More than 44,000 of these people have landed in Canada since November 2015.
The rebel offensive that ousted Assad from power on Sunday has prompted dozens of people to begin their return journey, gathering at some border crossings with neighboring countries such as Turkey, Lebanon and Jordan.
Marwa Khobieh, executive director of the Syrian Canadian Foundation, said she believes many families in Canada will be thinking anxiously about returning to see their loved ones and begin rebuilding the country. – but she said it's still not safe enough to consider a permanent move.
“I think most people would like to visit. In terms of movement? Not yet, because Syria is not stable yet and everyone still has a lot of concerns about the future and what 'go ahead,' said Khobieh, an activist who is not. has been back to Syria since she left for her own safety in 2012.
Rebuilding the country will be a huge task. Cities have been flattened, the country has been decimated, the economy has been crippled by international sanctions and millions of refugees are still living in camps after one of the biggest trends today.
Many refugees who do not have physical homes will be left behind in Syria.
Khobieh said they are resilient, but they need the support of the international and humanitarian community to rebuild the infrastructure and heal from the collective trauma.
The UN agency for international protection and humanitarian aid for refugees, UNHCR, directed a survey in 2023 to see how many refugees would want to go back to Syria. It found that 56 percent hoped to return one day, but only 1.1 percent planned to do so within the next year.
Before Assad's ouster, UNHCR had maintained for years that Syria was unsafe and said it would not help make big gains for refugees unless key protection conditions were in place. A statement on Tuesday said refugees should not be repatriated prematurely.
“They are considering how safe Syria will be and how long their rights will be respected before they can make an informed decision to return home.
The 1951 Refugee Convention stated that refugees are no longer in need of protection when the conditions that made the person a refugee “cease to exist,” but that change must be “fundamental and permanent. “
Human Rights Watch, which is also on warning again in the past that Syria is not safe to return to, they issued a statement on Monday saying that the fall of the dictator represents a seismic shift.
“The fall of Bashar al-Assad's government presents a unique opportunity for Syrians to chart a new future built on justice, accountability and respect for human rights,” wrote Lama Fakih, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch.
'We're all waiting to see what happens next'
Syria's new interim leader, Mohammed Al-Bashir, announced on Tuesday that he was taking charge of the country as a caretaker prime minister with the support of the former rebels who brought down Assad. Earlier in the day, banks opened in the Syrian capital for the first time.
Like Mostafa, Khadija Alsaeid is sure she will go back to the country she left when she was nine.
“As much as I love Canada, I love the Rocky Mountains – they are my favorite place to be – I would love to go back one day. It is my city It's back there. It's my country,” Alsaeid, 18, at a celebration rally in Calgary on Sunday.
Amir Fattal is also keen to go back, but is monitoring the government's move. He fled Aleppo in 2016 and now lives in Oakville, Ont. with his wife and children.
“We are all waiting to see what happens next and who is going to lead the country, but for sure, I am ready to contribute whatever I can to my country,” he told CBC News Network.
Mostafa also knows there will be issues to worry about before she can safely travel back. But for now, she embraces the kind of hope she hasn't known in her entire adult life.
“I am afraid of what is to come. But I know that Syria is free and my father is happy and he will be happy with us,” she said.
“Me, my children, Syrians… we are going to celebrate this day forever. “
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