The West Has Overlooked A Major Crisis In The Middle East
After traveling to Syria, Jordan and Turkey, I left with the impression that the West has taken no notice of the largest refugee crisis in the Middle East since 1948. According to the UNHCR officials in the region, about 4.5 million Iraqis are on the run: 2 million are internally displaced people, while more than 2 million have sheltered in neighboring countries. Today, Christians and other religious minorities face severe persecution in Iraq, and are among the most vulnerable group of refugees.
But there are no refugees in Syria, at least according to the Syrian government. The 1.4 million Iraqis who have arrived in recent years are known as guests (wafidin). And there are no Iraqi refugee camps in Syria, or in Jordan, Lebanon or Turkey, because of these countries’ experience with previous refugee crises. As a result, there has been little media coverage of the Iraqi refugee crisis in the western world, even though 2 million refugees have had to seek private accommodation in neighboring countries. Their forced absorption has caused a rapid rise in the cost of living for refugees and residents alike.
A Burden On Border Countries
Syria and Jordan, because of their geographical position, language and culture, are the preferred destinations for most refugees. The Jordanian government has pursued a pick-and-choose policy from the beginning, selecting only the better-off refugees. Today 750,000 refugees live in Jordan,
100,000 refugees have fled to Egypt, and 40,000 are in Lebanon. Turkey’s highly militarized border with Northern Iraq has been an effective barrier, but some 10,000 have made it anyhow, and most are waiting in Istanbul to depart for the West. But it is Syria, above all other countries, which has absorbed the highest number.
Changing Conditions In Syria
The Syrian government allowed Iraqis to enter the country without a visa and opened its schools and health care system to Iraqi children, a surprising policy considering the country’s destructive record in the region. One might see the policy as a strategy of the al-Assad government—the image of Syria as a safe haven for refugees supplanting the “rogue state” label—but the strategy has not paid off. With more than 1.4 million refugees (about 7% of the Syrian population), the society is starting to reach capacity. Today, some parts of Damascus are populated almost exclusively by Iraqis. This month, the Syrian government closed its borders to most Iraqis (excepting professionals such as engineers or doctors). The “guests” already staying in Syria are expected to return to Iraq and apply for visas at the Syrian embassy in Baghdad.
Problems For Internal Stability
Two sets of problems have arisen from the Syrian government’s formerly generous policy. First, the budget is under stress, as energy, health care, food and transportation are highly subsidized by the government. Even though refugees were often part of the former Iraqi middle class and have their own savings or family support, the highly regulated economy is too inflexible to absorb such numbers. Second, the Syrian regime fears that imported political tensions will threaten the country’s iron-fisted stability. Refugees without permission to work become part of the growing shadow economy. Others, dependent on external support, become more and more desperate by the lack of prospects.
Additionally, the huge influx of refugees (2500 per day) made it difficult for the Syrian government to prevent the infiltration of Mujahideen fighters. In the eyes of religious fanatics, the secular government of Bashar al-Assad and its Baath Party are as evil as the Saddam regime was. Even though the Assad regime itself is suspected to have fueled the Iraqi civil war during the first years (trying to weaken the US’ ability to act in the region) it is now fearing the conflict could spill over.
A Humanitarian Crisis and a Geopolitical Problem
All of Iraq’s neighbors share fears that the humanitarian crisis has become unmanageable. Growing tensions between the Turkish army and the Kurdish extremists are not the only symptom of spillover; the huge flows of Iraqi migration threaten stability in other border countries. The West must not use the lack of media coverage as an excuse to ignore the problem. The refugee crisis in the Middle East presents a serious geopolitical risk, and the transatlantic partners need to address it.
Jan Bittner works in the Policy Planning Staff of the CDU/CSU Parliamentary Group. He is Senior Foreign Policy Advisor to the Chairman of the Parliamentary Group. In October 2007 he participated in a field trip to Syria, Jordan and Turkey organized by the German Pontifical Mission Society (missio Aachen).
This is the first installment of a two-part series from Jan Bittner on the refugee crisis in the Middle East. The second installment will discuss policy recommendations for the West on how to deal with the problem.
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