Three decades into Syria’s displacement crisis – and even after the fall of the Assad regime at the end of 2024 – the question of whether millions of internally displaced persons (IDPs) can safely return home remains deeply unsettled. According to UN estimates, roughly 7.4 million Syrians remain displaced inside the country, including more than 2 million living in camps, most of them women and children. Nearly 5 million urban IDPs are scattered across cities and towns under difficult socio-economic conditions.
Although large-scale fighting has subsided, return to places of origin remains slow, cautious, and heavily constrained by overlapping security and humanitarian concerns. Persistent abuses, demographic engineering, widespread destruction, and the collapse of essential services continue to undermine any notion of a safe or sustainable return.
While the interim government has promoted return through amnesty measures and early rehabilitation, local actors and humanitarian groups argue that the environment remains far from secure. IDPs continue to stand at the centre of a national test that will determine whether post-conflict Syria can rebuild trust and stability.
Urban IDPs are concentrated primarily in rural Aleppo (20 percent), rural Damascus (19 percent), Idlib (15 percent), Damascus (12 percent), and Latakia (9 percent), with the remainder distributed across other governorates.
Slow and Limited Returns
Nasreddin Ibrahim, Secretary of the Kurdistan Democratic Party in Syria (Al-Parti), describes current returns to areas such as Afrin, Serekaniye, Tal Abyad, the Ghouta region, Homs, and Deir Ezzor as “slow and limited.”
Speaking to +963, he says returns remain overshadowed by fear and uncertainty – the result of ongoing security pressures, the lack of genuine guarantees for returnees, and continued demographic manipulation. Documented abuses in Afrin, Tal Abyad, and Serekaniye have deepened these fears, alongside instability in coastal areas and Suwayda.
Ibrahim adds that the absence of a political settlement, combined with renewed ISIS activity, has heightened anxiety. He argues that the transitional government has acted selectively based on political and demographic considerations, without clear plans for reconstruction, compensation, or reintegration.
A sustainable return, he says, requires security guarantees, transitional justice, restored services, and a national program that protects the rights of all Syrians.
Syrian journalist Baraa Othman tells +963 that returning IDPs to their areas of origin remains a core priority of the interim government led by President Ahmed Al-Sharaa.
Yet logistical and political burdens inherited from the former regime continue to slow progress. Othman identifies the security sector as the most significant obstacle, noting that re-establishing law enforcement, dismantling armed networks, and ensuring civilian protection are essential prerequisites.
He says the government is working to restore electricity, water systems, schools, and health centres in the most affected areas as a prelude to wider returns.
Since taking office, the government has adopted a markedly different approach – one rooted in equal citizenship rather than regional or demographic favouritism. A national return plan is being developed, he adds, combining security guarantees, financial support, and essential services, while empowering local councils and recently elected civilian administrations.
Decentralization, he argues, has helped strengthen trust between communities and state institutions. Recent executive measures – including a general amnesty, property-restoration mechanisms, and rapid rural reconstruction programs – signal a degree of governmental seriousness.
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Promises Not Yet Fulfilled
For Badran Jia Kurd, Deputy Co-Chair of the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria, the issue of return remains unresolved despite being both a humanitarian and national imperative.
He tells +963 that the lack of basic services, economic collapse, and unstable security and political conditions in areas under interim government control are among the principal barriers to return.
Jia Kurd describes the situation in Afrin, Serekaniye, and Tal Abyad as especially complex, citing ongoing abuses by armed factions and settlers – including ransom demands for occupied homes, refusal to return seized properties, and arbitrary security or financial measures imposed on returnees.
Government promises of return, he argues, have not translated into concrete action. He points to continued violations targeting Kurdish residents as part of broader demographic-engineering efforts, which render safe and dignified return nearly impossible.
Jia Kurd also says the government has avoided coordinating with the Autonomous Administration on organizing returns, withdrawing armed groups, or reintegrating communities. The case of displaced Deir Ezzor residents living in Afrin and elsewhere, he adds, requires a transitional justice process that holds perpetrators accountable while allowing civilians uninvolved in abuses to return freely.
In his view, the absence of urgent and comprehensive return policies – and the government’s focus on securing international legitimacy – has prolonged IDP suffering.
Who the IDPs Are
The UNHCR defines internally displaced persons as individuals forced to leave their homes due to conflict, generalized violence, human rights violations, or disasters, without crossing an internationally recognized border.
Syrian researcher Mazeed Al-Kreidi stresses the need to move beyond the idea of IDPs as a single, uniform group. Displacement in Syria, he tells +963, must be understood as a layered social, political, and economic process shaped by individual, collective, and structural dynamics.
Al-Kreidi distinguishes between those displaced for political reasons, those forced out by fighting and destruction, and those who fled insecurity or fear. Their needs, expectations, and ties to their home areas differ widely.
More than a decade of displacement has transformed return into a deeply complex decision – one shaped by psychological trauma, social fragmentation, and economic hardship.
He highlights key differences between urban IDPs who often adapt to their new environments and camp-based IDPs who live in far more precarious conditions, making their desire to return stronger despite the devastation in their home regions.
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Structural Barriers to Return
While security remains a decisive obstacle – due to power vacuums, widespread weapons, and the absence of rule of law – Al-Kreidi notes that it is far from the only one.
Widespread destruction, loss of property, and the collapse of essential services such as education, healthcare, water, and electricity create a wider structural barrier to safe and sustainable return. The ongoing economic crisis and lack of employment opportunities further complicate reintegration.
Psychological and social obstacles also weigh heavily, including eroded trust, fear of renewed instability, and weakened community support systems.
Despite the transitional government’s stated commitment to returning both IDPs and refugees – and UNHCR statistics indicating that roughly 1.8 million IDPs returned during the government’s first year – Al-Kreidi says these efforts have not yet formed a coherent national strategy.
Return, he concludes, will ultimately depend on security consolidation, institutional rebuilding, restored services, and a political settlement capable of re-establishing confidence.
