By Ahmed Kawkab in Anbar //

On the edge of Anbar province in central Iraq, the Bzeibiz camp for displaced people looks like many similar camps set up in Iraq when the extremist group known as the Islamic State, or IS, was fighting government forces. That is, there are rows of faded tents, dusty paths and many families apparently living in limbo.

However Bzeibiz displacement camp is different. It’s been here for 12 years and has transformed into a more permanent community.

Near the camp’s main dirt road, Sondos Turki, known as Um Mahdi, stands watching the wind tug at the corners of her tent. She counts her children with the vigilance of someone who has learned that life can change in a single moment. “The hardest responsibility is my children,” she says. “I’m not reassured about their health, their schooling, or anything in this camp.”

Her family fled Jurf al-Sakhar, a small town near Baghdad, in 2014, when it became a frontline in the fighting. Everyone expected to be able to return once the IS group was defeated, as they were in 2018, but in fact the area has remained a closed military zone. There is no civilian access and there is apparently no timeline for reopening the town.

As a result, according to Iraqi authorities, 1,430 families still live in Bzeibiz. Not a single family from Jurf al-Sakhar has been able to return home and what began as an emergency response has become a long-term humanitarian challenge.

“Displacement went from temporary to protracted,” explains Nofal Saad al-Fahdawi, director of the Anbar branch of Iraq’s Displacement and Migration Ministry. “People have been here for more than 12 years.”

Um Mahdi used to live off the land. She grew potatoes, raised livestock and produced dairy products from her own farm. Today she laments the fact that she must buy everything, even water.

For example, a tank of water costs around IQD10,000 (US$7.60) every 10 days or so, she notes. But her husband’s pension, which amounts to about IQD600.00 (US$457), must support a large extended family of around 17 people.

Inside Bzeibiz camp, a small economy has developed with vegetable stalls, makeshift workshops and a handful of services.

Among these is a tiny barbershop run by Abdullah Salman, who graduated university in 2024 with a degree in history, second in his class. With help from various aid groups, he built a barbershop from wooden panels. “Being a barber brings blessings,” he says with a smile.

Here, a child’s haircuts costs IQD3,000 (US$2.30) and an adult’s IQD5,000 (US$3.80) even though some weeks Salman says he makes almost no money at all. The young hairdresser says he’d love to go back and do a master’s degree but it’s very hard to think about the future or anything more permanent.

 “What if they suddenly open the door for us to return?” he says.

For many of the children here, the camp is the only thing they have ever known. Abdulsalam, 15, is kicking a worn football down one of the small alleys that cross-cross the camp. He was born in Jurf al-Sakhar but remembers nothing about it.

“They say we had an orchard,” he counts. “I don’t know what that looked like. I only know the tent. I wish I had a house that wasn’t a tent.”

There are schools in the camp, but they are overcrowded and further education elsewhere often depends on whether families can afford transportation and supplies.

In one corner of the camp, Um Saja, 46, also teaches young girls inside her tent. Her home in Jurf al-Sakhar was bombed the night before she fled. She was also a farmer once but now she sews and teaches to support her five daughters, some of whom are university age. “It’s a struggle,” she concedes.

As for other infrastructure, the camp’s power generator was removed and its water station shut down after some other residents returned home and Bzeibiz was stripped of what little it had.

The camp’s only health center often runs out of basic medicines.

“Sometimes even paracetamol is not available,” says Hani Saleh, 54. His wife suffers from diabetes, hypertension and liver issues. Her medication costs IQD22,000 (US$16.80) every 19 days but his pension amounts to only around IQD570,000 (US$434) and he needs to support 26 other relatives too.

“Good people help us more than the state,” he says.

Aid workers have also issued warnings that the situation here is deteriorating.

“The camp lacks basic necessities — water, food, medicine,” says Muzaffar al‑Ani, director of a relief organization that works inside Bzeibiz. The government must either facilitate returns or build low‑cost housing, he argues, because very soon, the camp won’t even be able to supply the inhabitants’ basic needs.

Local officials acknowledge the problems. “The administrative situation is fine but services are almost non-existent,” says Sultan al-Issawi, the district official responsible for the camp. “Without return, the situation will worsen.”

As for the camp’s inhabitants, all they now have questions. They wonder how they can build a future when they might be asked to leave for somewhere new at any time. And for many, the biggest question has changed over the past 12 years. It’s gone from “when will we be able to return?” to “will we ever be able to return?”