NORTHERN ALEPPO COUNTRYSIDE, Syria — The Syrian government is working to lure displaced residents back to regime-controlled areas, even as the opposition hopes to keep that from happening.

Among those originally displaced from Homs' al-Waer neighborhood, 574 people, or nearly a hundred families, came back July 10 to the regime-held city. They had left the Zoghra camp, which is near Jarablus in the Operation Euphrates Shield area in the northeastern Aleppo countryside — namely the areas the operation liberated from the Islamic State. A few hours after their arrival in Homs, the regime allowed the displaced to return to their houses once they were searched and their names checked on the list of returnees.

Darar al-Homsi, who was displaced from al-Waer, accompanied the returnees from the camp to the military crossing between the Free Syrian Army (FSA) and the regime forces south of al-Bab, before he returned to the camp. He told Al-Monitor that the convoy consisted of 1,000 people protected by a Turkish military force to the entrance of the regime-held areas. Homsi added, “574 people reached their destination, while the rest of the families changed their minds before arriving at the crossing between the regime and FSA. This is after the FSA militants managed to convince them to stay and promised to provide better services at the camp.”

Homsi said, “Those willing to return [to Homs] have had their names registered at the Zoghra camp since early June, more than a month before the convoy departed. From the beginning, the whole process took place with the knowledge of the Turkish officials in the Euphrates Shield area, which is a Turkish area of influence.”