Why do people in War zones don't "just" leave?

23 Aug, 2025

It’s more complex than it looks from the outside.

In wars, people don’t divide neatly into “those who flee” and “those who stay.”

Many are unable to leave (involuntary immobility), while others choose to stay despite danger (voluntary immobility).

Often it’s a mix of the two. Below is a structured, critical take that tries to be exhaustive.

1) Hard constraints: people literally can’t get out

• Borders and checkpoints are closed or tightly controlled. Without visas, permits, or an open crossing, departure is impossible, even for the desperate. (For Gaza specifically, movement of people has been heavily restricted for years and tightened further since Oct 2023.) (OCHA Territorio Palestino Ocupado)
• Roads are unsafe. Evacuation routes are frequently shelled or otherwise dangerous unless parties agree to—and respect—formal arrangements (corridors, localized pauses, protected zones). In their absence, getting in a car can be riskier than sheltering in place. (CICR, Chatham House)
• Logistics collapse. No fuel, no public transport, destroyed bridges, curfews—mobility requires basic infrastructure that war wipes out. (fmreview.org)

2) The cost calculus: fleeing is expensive and risky

• Poverty traps people. Transport, rent in a safer area, smugglers’ fees, bribes—these are out of reach for many. Research on “trapped” populations shows the poorest are the least mobile in crises. (Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP), fmreview.org)
• Dangers en route can be extreme. Displaced people face kidnapping, trafficking, sexual violence, and death on some routes; families may judge these risks as worse than staying. (UNHCR, Reuters)
• Health and caregiving constraints. Older adults, people with disabilities, the sick, or infants can’t handle long journeys or crowded shelters; caregivers stay with them. (General humanitarian analyses highlight this as a core driver of immobility.) (PMC)

3) Information, psychology, and timing

• Normalcy & optimism biases. Humans under-react to unfolding disasters, hoping “this round will pass like the last one.” That delay can close the window for safe exit. (The Decision Lab, Scribbr)
• Fog of war & rumor. People receive conflicting orders; they don’t trust warnings or can’t verify which areas are actually safer. When information is costly or contradictory, many default to staying put.

4) Security logic that favors staying

• Home may be safer than the road today. Without verified pauses/corridors, civilians often survive by reading local patterns of attack and sheltering accordingly. Evacuations without guarantees can feel like walking into an ambush. (CICR, Chatham House)
• Multiple prior displacements. After being uprooted repeatedly, some decide they cannot risk another move to yet another “unsafe safe zone.” (Gaza updates repeatedly note renewed displacement orders disrupting aid and services.) (OCHA Territorio Palestino Ocupado)

5) Social, cultural, and political reasons

• Attachment to land, graves, community. Place is identity; abandoning it can feel like erasing yourself.
• Protecting property & claims. People fear looting or permanent loss of homes/land if they leave; in some contexts, property laws have historically penalized absence, shaping people’s decisions to remain. (NRC, Naciones Unidas)
• Steadfastness as a value. In Palestine, the idea of sumud (“steadfastness”) frames staying as dignity and resistance, not passivity. (palquest.org, PMC)
• Community obligations. Leaders, medics, neighbors looking after elders or kids may feel morally bound to stay.

6) Law, coercion, and politics

• Parties may block departures. In sieges and urban fighting, armed actors have at times prevented exits or failed to establish safe evacuation procedures—even though IHL requires precautions and protections for civilians who flee. (CICR)
• “Evacuation orders” can be coercive. International law allows evacuations in narrow circumstances; outside those, pushing civilians out can amount to forced displacement. Civilians caught in this gray zone may distrust orders and remain. (EJIL: Talk!)

7) Livelihood and animals

• Livestock, fields, shops. Farmers need to feed animals and guard crops; small-business owners fear losing everything if they go. Empirical work notes seasonality and agricultural ties as concrete reasons people stay. (Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (SWP))
• Pets. Many will not abandon companion animals when shelters or borders won’t accept them.

Applied to Gaza (2023–2025), briefly

• Exits are structurally limited. Long-standing movement restrictions into/out of Gaza intensified after Oct 2023, leaving most civilians with no viable route out. (OCHA Territorio Palestino Ocupado)
• “No place is safe.” UN updates have repeatedly warned that even areas designated for civilians face hostilities; people are ordered to move again and again, often through dangerous corridors. (OCHA Territorio Palestino Ocupado)
• Aid routes are contested and risky. Fatal incidents near crossings and intermittent, highly constrained aid flows make movement hazardous and survival precarious. (OCHA Territorio Palestino Ocupado)
• The result: many Gazans cannot leave due to sealed borders and lack of visas/crossings, and many won’t leave their last anchors—family, community, property—without credible guarantees of safety and a place to go. (OCHA Territorio Palestino Ocupado)

A simple framework to read these decisions

• Capacity to move (documents, money, transport, corridors) × Willingness to move (risk/benefit beliefs, identity, duty). When either is near zero, people stay—sometimes heroically, often tragically. (fmreview.org)

What actually helps (evidence-informed)

• Real, negotiated civilian arrangements (corridors, localized pauses, protected zones) with independent monitoring—otherwise people won’t risk the road. (Chatham House)
• Cash and transport assistance targeted to the most immobile (older adults, disabled, single-headed households). (PMC)
• Protection against en-route abuses (anti-trafficking, GBV services, safe registration points). (UNHCR)
• Legal/documentation support (temporary visas, family reunification, recognition of property/tenancy so departure doesn’t mean permanent loss). (NRC)

Bottom line: staying is rarely just “stubbornness.” It’s usually a constrained, rational response to a thicket of barriers, dangers, identities, and duties—and in places like Gaza, there often isn’t a real, safe exit at all. (OCHA Territorio Palestino Ocupado, CICR)