an estimated 9.5 million Syrians have been forced to flee their homes; over 3 million of those have fled the country.

The UN estimates that by the end of this year, as many as 4 million Syrians could be living abroad as refugees.

So, where are all of these displaced Syrians going?

and can the international community really support 9 million displaced individuals?

Well, the majority of displaced Syrians, around 6.5 million, have fled their homes but are still living inside of Syria.

Other large groups of refugees have crossed into neighboring countries,

the majority of whom fled to Lebanon (~1.2 million of them) and Turkey (~1 million of them),

although Jordan, Iraq, Egypt, and other North African countries also have a sizable number.

But re-locating and providing services for 9.5 million refugees, soon to be almost 10.5 million, can’t exclusively be a regional problem.

Syria and the surrounding areas just don’t have the resources, or the stability,

to house a refugee population of that size.

So, the United Nations has called on the international community to help.

The EU and the US have responded,

but mainly in the form of financial support and humanitarian aid to Syria and its neighboring nations.

The US has given more than 2.9 billion dollars in humanitarian aid

and the EU has given roughly 3.5 billion dollars,

but there aren’t many places willing to take in refugees on such a large scale.

Germany has agreed to shelter 28,500 Syrian refugees this year, which is no small amount.

The US has agreed to take in roughly 33,000 refugees this year from the Near East and South Asia regions,

but they aren’t specifying Syrians.

So, some of those slots may be taken up by asylum seekers from other countries.

The rest of the international community plans on taking in at least 14,000 refugees in 2014, if not more.

A lot of these nations plan on increasing the number of refugees they can take on year over year,

but for now - most of the responsibility for these displaced Syrians remains on Syria and its surrounding nations;

a fact that is causing huge humanitarian problems for the region

and adding undue stress to nations like Iraq and Lebanon that are already struggling with their own stability issues.