STEVE INSKEEP, HOST:
The new government of Syria has been looking for ways to improve relations with its neighbor, Israel. That's a big change from the prior Syrian government, the declared enemy of Israel, which was also the host of many Palestinian refugees. NPR's Jane Arraf went to Damascus, Syria, to see what's changing.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Non-English language spoken).
JANE ARRAF, BYLINE: A man selling cakes from a wooden pushcart makes his way through mostly empty streets in Damascus' Yarmouk Camp. Before the Syrian regime put down an uprising in 2011 and ushered in 14 years of civil war, Yarmouk was the biggest Palestinian refugee camp in Syria. It's in ruins now, destroyed mostly by Syrian and Russian airstrikes.
UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: (Non-English language spoken).
ARRAF: There isn't a single building here that hasn't been heavily damaged. Some of them have been destroyed. They're just piles of rubble.
SALAH AL BARGHOUTI: Come on.
ARRAF: Some have hung on, like Salah Al Barghouti (ph). His father was one of tens of thousands of Palestinians who fled to Syria in 1948 with the creation of Israel and was never allowed back. Barghouti is 63. Two of his children were killed in the civil war here, his shop destroyed. But Syria is the only home he has ever known.
BARGHOUTI: (Non-English language spoken).
ARRAF: "If we go back to our country, Palestine," he says, "what can we do? This is our country, too. I was raised here. I was born here." Syria was ruled for more than 60 years by a party whose founding ideology was intertwined with the struggle for a Palestinian homeland. What's left of the camp remains a testament to the now millions of stateless Palestinians. Omar Hameed (ph), a banker who grew up in the camp, reads fading script on a concrete wall.
OMAR HAMEED: Jerusalem, we will return. We shall return.
ARRAF: Syria's toppled President Bashar Al Assad and his father, Hafez, considered themselves leaders of resistance against Israel. One might think that Syria's new president, a former Islamic militant, might as well. But Ahmad al-Sharaa has renounced that ideology. And he's taken the extraordinary step of opening the door to ties with Israel. Sharaa has made clear that Syria will not pose a threat to Israel. Syrian officials say talk of signing a peace deal is premature, but even the limited measures Syria has taken are a dramatic reversal. In the middle of Damascus is the Palestinian embassy, a set of offices on a quiet street. Ambassador Samir Al-Rifai tells us Iran's decline in influence with the fall of the Syrian regime has had a huge impact.
SAMIR AL-RIFAI: (Through interpreter) What happened in Syria significantly changed the Palestinian situation and the map of the factions and their alliances.
ARRAF: Rifai says it seems clear there will be a new relationship with Israel.
AL-RIFAI: (Through interpreter) We observe and do not interfere in the affairs of any Arab country. But we believe that peace is on the horizon. As for what this peace will look like for the Palestinians, we do not know.
UNIDENTIFIED ANNOUNCER: (Non-English language spoken).
ARRAF: You might think that Sharaa's base of conservative Sunni Muslims would oppose warming up to Israel, particularly during the devastating war in Gaza. But Syrians say they have to focus on their own country now.
LAMA MADWA: (Non-English language spoken).
ARRAF: "It's normal. Let us live," says Lama Madwar (ph), a businesswoman at a recent public celebration. "We're exhausted. We want peace. We want to open up the country."
(SOUNDBITE OF KNIFE CHOPPING)
ARRAF: In the Sheikh Muhyadeen Market (ph) in Damascus, Ahmed Atiya (ph), who's 27, works at a butcher shop.
AHMED ATIYA: (Non-English language spoken).
ARRAF: He's a third-generation refugee. He says Syrians are very sympathetic to the Palestinians. Palestinian refugees here don't have citizenship, but they have more rights than in many other Arab countries.
ATIYA: (Non-English language spoken).
ARRAF: We go to school together. We go to the same universities in Damascus. There's no discrimination, he says.
(CROSSTALK)
ARRAF: For most Palestinian refugees, reclaiming their homeland is a dream they still hold onto. But Syria and its move to ties with Israel is the reality.
Jane Arraf, NPR News, Damascus.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC) Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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