Looking Back: The Refugees Trapped in a Corner of Syria, Now Free

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0:39Start 2026 on a high note and invest in a public service that matters to you. Visit plus.npr.org. Thanks. Now here's the show. Today on State of the World, looking back at refugees once trapped in a remote corner of Syria. You're listening to State of the World from NPR. We bring you the day's most vital international stories up close where they're happening. I'm Greg Dixon. As we say goodbye to 2025, our international reporters are looking back at some of the stories they covered in the last year. Jane Araf is based in Amman, Jordan. And Jane, you've brought us a story that you did in December of 2024.

1:20It was a first look at a refugee camp that you just gotten access to. Yes. In fact, we were told we were the only reporters ever to visit that camp that had been there for more than 10 years. And the reason we were the only reporters is because it was hemmed in. They were surrounded on all sides by Assad regime forces, the Russians, and Jordan wouldn't let them cross. Iraq wouldn't let them cross, even though they were right there at the borders. I had tried and tried to get there through Jordan, and the closest I ever got was a trip on the back of a military Jordanian vehicle where they brought us close to the camp, but would not let us enter because they said it was too dangerous.

2:02This is on the border between Jordan, Iraq, and Syria, and these are people that had fled the Syrian regime when the fighting started. Is that right? They actually fled in 2014, for the most part, when ISIS took over a large part of Syria and Iraq. So they were fleeing ISIS, and they believed that they could cross over into Jordan or Iraq, because there's that little triangle there where three countries meet, and nobody would let them in. Jordan, struggling with a lot of refugees, didn't want more, believed that some of them might potentially be ISIS. but they were actually running from ISIS. So they end up in this desert where no one is supposed to live.

2:45There's no water. There's no shade. They make their houses from mud. There are no doctors. Children die and nobody knows why. So when we got on that highway and we drove for hours and we finally got a look at this camp, I almost literally couldn't believe that we were actually there and we were going to be able to report on what was happening. Let's listen to your report from the Rukban camp in December 2024. These children chasing each other in the sand were born here in this remote desert encampment. Miles and miles of rocky desert, no water, no shade, constant wind. It's a place no one would ever choose to live.

3:30But nine years ago, Syrians fleeing ISIS left their homes and massed here in the desert of southern Syria, hoping Jordan would let them in. For a while, it did. But then the gates slammed shut, leaving them hemmed in by ISIS and regime forces. And the community grew. Children were born here. And children died. Without a single doctor here, in a lot of cases, no one ever knew why. They've seen snakes and scorpions. But a lot of these kids have never seen a tree. Some have never tasted fruit. They've only seen a few visitors before. And certainly no journalists. One of the kids asks for a water pipe.

4:15Another for cigarettes. Until the Syrian regime fell, this community of 7 ,000 people was cut off from the outside world. Many of the men here fought with opposition forces. Syrian and Russian troops controlled the highway out. The desert was mined. I've been trying for years to get here. The U.S. military has a base near here, but it wouldn't bring in journalists. Jordan said it was too dangerous to let people across. You are the first journalist from anywhere of any kind to ever make it here, ever. That's Moaz Mustafa, an activist and the director of a U.S. organization, the Syrian Emergency Task Force.

4:54In 2016, the U.S. military established its small base about 30 miles from here as part of its anti-ISIS operations. Two years ago, Mustafa persuaded the military to bring in medical supplies and visiting doctors when they had space on their aircraft. Water here comes from UNICEF, piped in across the border from Jordan. For the past several years, Jordan has not allowed even aid deliveries, saying it's too dangerous for aid groups to enter. It sealed the border in 2016 after a suicide bomber killed six Jordanian soldiers. And there are other dangers. I'm standing in front of a sand berm about six feet high with a trench in the middle.

5:37On the other side is Jordan and an American base, Tower 22. It's essentially a support base for their outpost here in Syria at Al-Temf. It was the base that was attacked by Iranian drones earlier this year. Three American soldiers were killed in that attack. Mustafa says until he persuaded the U.S. military to visit the camp, there was almost no contact. After that, he says, the U.S. base embraced the community, helping to bring in and distribute aid and providing medical care when it could. The U.S. military declined to speak about the camp. Funded by donations, Mustafa's group opened a pharmacy and started a school.

6:18It even took a census and held elections. Nine years we've been without a doctor, Abu Muhammad Khadr says. He had to leave school after the ninth grade. but he runs the pharmacy funded by the American organization. He says all the medicine here is from the U.S. Allergy cream and infant formula and baby cereal, antibiotics. Khaled Hamadi comes in for blood pressure medication. They don't have a lot, but whatever they have is provided free. People here first came with tents. But they were no match for the wind, cold, and heat. After a while, we decided to use the clay to make bricks, and then walls, and then we built houses, Khadr says.

7:07We came here because of the border. We thought maybe the neighboring countries would help us. But unfortunately, they didn't. The few here who had some money could buy food smuggled in past regime forces. But most people survived on dried bread, lentils, and rice. Khadr takes us to his home for breakfast. A relative feast now that the road is open. Cheese and olives and flavorful beans. There are small openings in the mud brick walls for windows, covered with clear plastic instead of glass. For years, there were no diapers for babies. At another home, Afaf Abu Muhammad tells us that when her children were infants, she used plastic bags.

7:49Her eldest daughter, Sha 'ala Hajib, is 16. She was born with a spinal defect and can't walk. The parents were told once by a visiting doctor could be corrected with surgery. But here, that's a distant dream. In their hometowns, these people came from all backgrounds. Farmers, teachers. Fawaz Talib was a veterinarian when he fled Humps in 2015. He shows us the mud brick rooms his family lives in. They can't afford to buy the sticks of wood that are sold for fuel. So in winter, they burn plastic bags and even strips of old tires for heat. The children here have a lot of chest problems because of this, he says.

8:34Almost everyone says they'd leave here and go home now if they could. For now, they're waiting for help, for money to rent trucks to take them back. But they're overjoyed that they're no longer trapped. On the way to Rukban the day before, we meet one family on the highway that managed to leave the desolate camp. The old truck is piled high with iron bars from their dismantled roof and mattresses. Padifala says he's taking his family back to Homs.

9:09Freedom, he keeps saying, there is nothing more beautiful than freedom. All four of the children crammed into the front seat were born in the camp. We're accompanied by Mustafa, who's practically bouncing with excitement to see families returning home. Thank God, a thousand congratulations, he tells the family.

9:35Back in the vehicle, an official from the interim Syrian foreign ministry, Obeda Arnon, who's also on the journey, starts singing about Homs, also his hometown. He's saying, take me to Homs. My eyes have been crying for your Homs. It was one of the many songs forbidden in the past. But for now, these few days after the fall of the regime, the future is an open road. Jane Araf, NPR News, in the southern Syrian desert. That was Jane Araf reporting on the Rukban camp in Syria in December 2024. Jane, you followed one family leaving the camp. What happened to the rest of them? Have they left? They now have all left, but it took a long time.

10:21You know, the ones who had a bit of money, enough to hire a truck to go and see if they could live like in the ruins of their destroyed houses. Those people left. But then there were people there with no money whatsoever, none at all. And they had to wait till somebody stepped up and paid for them to be able to get back to where they were from. So that camp is now closed down. But, you know, I still think of it. And when I was in Damascus at the beginning of this December for the anniversary of the fall of the regime, I was meeting the Syrian-American activist, Moaz Mustafa, who helped draw attention to them and helped get U.S.

11:00military aid to them. And I walk into the hotel lobby, and there he is with some of the people that I had met and interviewed when we went. It was incredible. There was the man who ran the makeshift clinic. There was a guy who was in charge of security. There was the one who showed me the schools that they had built out of mud brick. And I asked them how they were doing, how their families were doing. And they talked about their kids still trying to adapt. One of them talked about his young son who had never seen steps before. So he was still having a hard time figuring out how to climb steps.

11:41You know, none of these kids had ever seen the tree. It took them a long time to, you know, walk without staring up at these big trees over them. So a huge transition, but it was just so incredibly wonderful and so rare. I mean, how rare is it that something like that happens, that a regime falls, that people get to go home? And part of that was seeing all of these guys again. You know, lots of hugs with Mustafa, the activist, and lots of reminiscences. And in retrospect, I guess it all just seems not nearly as harsh and horrible as it actually was for 10 years when you're looking at it in retrospect.

12:27What a fascinating experience, Jane. Thank you very much for bringing it to us. Thank you. That was Jane Araf.

12:39That's the State of the World from NPR. Happy holidays and thanks for listening.