THE REACH OF WAR; Uneasy Exiles Await Those Who Flee the Chaos in Iraq

By HASSAN M. FATTAH; SUHA MAAYEH CONTRIBUTED REPORTING FROM AMMAN, AND RASHA ELASS FROM DAMASCUS, SYRIA.
Published: December 8, 2006
The New York Times

Every day at dusk as the streets of this brooding city empty, people like Halima Reyahi scramble to become invisible again.

She sticks to side streets, her eyes scanning for the increasingly frequent police dragnets and checkpoints set up in search of illegal Iraqi immigrants like her. The loneliness of her exile is magnified by the fact that all four of her sons have been turned away repeatedly at the Jordanian border.

Ms. Reyahi is one of nearly two million Iraqis who have fled the vicious chaos of their country since the American invasion nearly four years ago, flooding neighboring states, especially Jordan and Syria, but also Lebanon and Egypt.

As they leave Iraq at a rate of nearly 3,000 a day, , the refugees are threatening the social and economic fabric of both Jordan and Syria. In Jordan, hundreds of thousands of Iraqis are trying to blend into a country of only 6 million inhabitants, including about 1.5 million registered Palestinian refugees. The governments classify most of the Iraqis as visitors, not refugees.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees estimated in a report released last month that more than 1.6 million Iraqis have left since March 2003, nearly 7 percent of the population. Jordanian security officials say more than 750,000 are in and around Amman, a city of 2.5 million. Syrian officials estimate that up to a million have gone to the suburbs of Damascus, a city of three million. An additional 150,000 have landed in Cairo. Every month, 100,000 more join them in Syria and Jordan, the report said.

In a report released this week, Refugees International, a Washington-based advocacy group, put the total at close to two million and called their flight ''the fastest-growing humanitarian crisis in the world.'' Its president, Kenneth Bacon, said, ''The United States and its allies sparked the current chaos in Iraq, but they are doing little to ease the humanitarian crisis caused by the current exodus.''

Every night, hulking orange and white GMC Suburbans and sedans pull into the taxi garage in downtown Amman stuffed with Iraqis and their belongings, adding to the growing social problems they pose while fueling growing fears that Iraq's sectarian tensions will spill over here.
As Iraq seems to disintegrate into warring factions of Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds, the risk that their dispute will be transferred here and increase local social problems is frightening the authorities. As a result, restrictions on Iraqis have been tightened in Egypt, Syria and Jordan, which has been increasing patrols seeking to evict those who have overstayed their visas.
Most of the émigrés bring tales of horror and sadness. Ali Ghani, a onetime champion Iraqi body builder, said that his father had been grabbed from their house in Iraq, apparently because he was a Shiite; his body was later found in the street. Several other friends have met a similar fate, he said.

Partly as a result of such strife, refugees here claim, there is a growing sectarian dimension to the official crackdown. They say the authorities of this officially Sunni country have paid more attention to deporting Iraqi Shiites, fearing that their militias are trying to organize here.
''There is only disrespect for us now,'' said Qais Attiyeh, 36, a Shiite sculptor who says he has been granted refugee status in Amman. ''And now I increasingly find Jordanians who ask me, 'Are you a Shiite or a Muslim?' '' he said, referring to extremist Sunnis' rejection of Shiism as a branch of Islam.

''I read their facial expressions and tell them what they like to hear,'' he said.
Faris Braizat, a researcher at the Center for Strategic Studies at Jordan University, said, ''It's becoming clear that with these kinds of numbers we are creating a massive problem further down the road.'' Jordanians, once proud of their Iraqi neighbors, have become unwilling to continue sacrificing for them, he said.

The first wave of Iraqis, mostly doctors, intellectuals and teachers, came here after the Persian Gulf war in 1991, escaping Saddam Hussein's Iraq. After the American invasion of 2003, a similarly wealthy wave of former government figures, businessmen and investors came here with billions of dollars that they soon began investing in real estate and businesses. Their arrival drove up prices but was also credited with helping the economy. As their numbers grew and much poorer people started to arrive, however, the problems began.

In particular, when Iraqi suicide bombers attacked three Amman hotels in 2005, this country's attitude toward Iraqis changed abruptly. The attack was organized by Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, which was led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian. Jordanian officials stepped up immigration enforcement, turning away many Iraqis at the border and making it harder for Iraqis to renew their visas.

It remains the case that those able to deposit $150,000 in Amman banks are granted residency almost instantly here. A few have also been sponsored by employers or have married Jordanian women. But the vast majority, poor and with few options, enter on visitor visas and soon become illegal, opening them up to exploitation and abuse.

Human Rights Watch called on the Jordanian government last week to grant Iraqis temporary protection and legalize their status. The group also called on the Jordanians to halt the deportation of Iraqis who registered for temporary protection and to admit asylum seekers, in addition to exempting Iraqis who registered their status from having to pay stiff fines.
Iraqis are increasingly blamed for Jordan's ills. Those with cash are blamed for doubling, and even tripling, property prices, as well as for buoying prices on everything from tomatoes to cigarettes. (Less attention has been paid to the broader market forces that led to the rise.)
The average price of a three-bedroom apartment in upscale West Amman has risen to up to $150,000 from about $50,000. Apartments that once rented for $400 now rent for $1,200, pricing out the average Jordanian, who earns between $500 and $750 per month.
Khaled Saeed, who owns a DVD shop in downtown Amman, was saving for years to buy an apartment near Amman's Sports City complex. He had his eye on one building where, just a few years ago, apartments sold for the equivalent of $35,000.

Then the Iraqis came, he said.

''When I finally came to buy it after some time, I found that the price had risen to 45,000 dinars,'' he said, amounting to almost $65,000. ''So I've changed my mind about the Iraqis. Now I just wish they would leave so that life would go back to normal.''

Late this summer the government loosened restrictions on private education for Iraqis without residency here, flooding Jordanian schools with new students. Principals have found themselves in the awkward position of telling families they have to go elsewhere.

Inflation, too, has doubled to 6 percent from about 3.5 percent in 2005, fueled in part by reduced subsidies on oil and gasoline, and by growing demand from Iraqis, economists say.
Many refugees say the crackdown has focused attention on Shiites, even as the government has hunted down Al Qaeda. Even before this, Shiite prayer halls, known as Husseiniyas, were strictly banned here. Security officials have been wary of Shiites seeking to organize and preach Shiite teachings. A prominent sheik representing Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani of Iraq was deported late this summer.

In the Jordanian town of Muta, the site of a historic battle between Muslim and Byzantine armies,the shrine of the Shiite saint Jaffar al-Tayyar, a pilgrimage site, has come under particularly close scrutiny lately. Last week, security men crawled around the site, keeping an eye on the comings and goings of visitors.

Shiite pilgrims have been banned from sleeping overnight at the site and are now allowed to stay only briefly, a shop owner at the shrine said. Where thousands once came, the number of visitors has dropped markedly, he said, for fear of the security men, and his sales have plummeted.
Security men at the site said they were concerned about attacks against Shiites there, rather than trouble from the Shiites themselves.

Still many Shiites say they are increasingly bearing the brunt of the growing frustration with the Iraqis here.

''When you say 'deported,' people typically think 'Shia' now,'' one former Jordanian official said. ''They are afraid that they will connect with the groups in Iraq.''

Security officials say they have sought to weed out both Sunnis and Shiites who intend to cause trouble in Iraq, and do not differentiate between the sects. ''We don't have a problem with someone trying to advance his Shiite faith,'' the security official said. ''But we do have a problem with someone proselytizing and being political.''

The Iraqi exodus has sent ripples through Syria, too, where the government has maintained an open-door policy for Iraqis, attracting mainly poor Iraqis who have flocked to neighborhoods like Sayeda Zeynab, the site of a Shiite shrine, creating little ghettos.

There, too, rents have risen, more than doubling in poorer areas like Jaramana, a suburb of Damascus. Some officials have begun warning of impending electricity and water shortages in Syria because of the influx of Iraqis. The price of heating oil and gasoline is expected to rise along with the increased demand.