Longings for home drove Syria’s liberation

The rebel group that felled a dictatorship found part of its legitimacy in calling on displaced Syrians to return home – not just to a place, but to the generosity that makes home the vital center of spiritual life.

The Monitor's View

Since Dec. 8, when a long dictatorship in Damascus fell quickly to a rebel group, many of the more than 12 million people displaced by Syria’s conflicts have probably told their loved ones, “We are going home.”

“I feel like I’ve been born again,” Maysaara, a refugee in Belgium, told The New Yorker, packing his bags. “I prayed to live long enough to see this day.”

That longing for home was always a strong sentiment among the more than half of Syria’s population that was displaced by 13 years of war and lived either inside Syria or as refugees from Turkey to Europe to Canada. It may also have been a strong reason the Assad regime crumbled so quickly.

“To the displaced all over the world, free Syria awaits you,” one commander, Hassan Abdul Ghani, posted on X after the regime’s collapse.

The desire for home – as a sanctuary, a place of safety, a reflection of dignity, and an expression of family affection – often can influence a conflict in subtle ways. Nearly 120 million people – not quite half of the global migrant population – have been displaced by conflict, violence, or natural disasters. Less noticed are the streams of people returning home. In 2023 alone, 6.1 million displaced people returned to their areas or countries of origin, according to the International Catholic Migration Commission. Many do so voluntarily, to rebuild and restore.

The desire to return home underscores that home is not just a place. For Syrians, home before the war started was seen “as enriching multigenerational relationships with family and friends, intertwined with culture, faith, a love of place,” according to a 2023 study published in Wellbeing, Space and Society.

“Beyond the family,” the study found, “Syrian men and women described social networks where faith was central and included close friendships with neighbors and community members and which reflected values and a way of life where others could be depended upon for support and care.”

In Arab societies, Muslim and Christian alike, home is also vital to a spiritual obligation of hospitality – “generosity of spirit ... which defines humanity itself,” observed Mona Siddiqui, professor of Islamic and Interreligious Studies at the University of Edinburgh.

The rebel forces that have toppled the regime of Bashar al-Assad have struck chords of reconciliation. The new leadership has granted a general amnesty for “crimes” committed before Dec. 8, signaling the release of an estimated 150,000 people detained by the fallen regime – many on the pretense of criticizing the state. The rebels have also vowed to protect the rights of religious minorities.

But for countless Syrians preparing to return to their communities, the journey is a path not just to a place, but to spiritual renewal. As a very diverse nation now tries to find national unity, it may find it in that special desire for belonging that defines the Syrian people.