Almost 120,000 Syrians have returned to their country from neighboring Lebanon since the latest conflict erupted between Israel and Hezbollah, according to International Organization for Migration figures provided to AFP.
“As of 17 March, 125,784 people have entered Syria from Lebanon” since the fighting there began, “about 119,000 of whom are Syrians,” according to the figures from the UN agency’s Displacement Tracking Matrix.
Lebanon — which hosts around 1 million Syrians who fled their country’s civil war starting in 2011 — was drawn into the Middle East war on March 2 when Iran-backed terror group Hezbollah attacked Israel following US-Israeli strikes that killed Iran’s supreme leader.
Israel has responded with intense strikes on Lebanon and expanded ground operations in the south, where the health ministry said four Syrians were killed yesterday.
Syria has so far stayed out of the regional war.
More than half a million Syrians returned from Lebanon last year, according to the UN refugee agency, following the 2024 fall of longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad, who was supported by Iran and Hezbollah.
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