Iraqis have been fleeing their homes en masse. As displaced victims of war are forced to seek refuge in other parts of Iraq or in neighboring nations, they have turned into a number: 4.9 million anonymous non-entities, statistically relevant yet individually insignificant.

The days of my stay in Syria offered a small window into the magnitude of a catastrophe that is still...
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Iraqis have been fleeing their homes en masse. As displaced victims of war are forced to seek refuge in other parts of Iraq or in neighboring nations, they have turned into a number: 4.9 million anonymous non-entities, statistically relevant yet individually insignificant.

The days of my stay in Syria offered a small window into the magnitude of a catastrophe that is still unfolding and shows little sign of lessening in immediately future.

At a first glance, Sayyida Zainab doesn't seem much different from any other Damascus neighborhood, until one listens carefully: the Iraqi dialect spoken here transports one from Syria to Baghdad.

This is where Iraqi refugees come to escape war and sectarian violence until they can return to their homes again. But if one asks how long that may take, the uncertainty is immediately apparent in their gaze and in their repeated phrase, "Iraq's future is like a long dark tunnel."

Here, far away from their homeland, desperate, almost penniless Iraqi refugees congregate on "Iraqi Street," a road that serves simultaneously as a community center, a market, and an access to nearby living quarters. As one passes the tea sellers and other merchants who are the nerve center of the neighborhood, one can start to imagine what life used to be like in Iraq - before.

Sayyida Zainab represents an enclave where sectarian divisions are a foreign concept. It is a sensitive topic, but many refugees assert: "We are Iraqis! We don't refer to ourselves as Sunni or Shiia, we are all Iraqis here!"

Some Iraqis - lured by the appearance of a reduction in violence in Iraq; by the thought of escaping the desperation they witness every day as refugees - cross the border back to Iraq. Others still fear for their lives and stay.

Syria is home to over one million Iraqis living there as "guests", without official recognition as refugees. They have extremely limited prospects - they are without the ability to earn a legal income or create new lives.
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