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BEIRUT — People chosen to resettle in Canada will be getting “the million-dollar ticket,” said Mohammed Hamadi as he helped marshal Syrian refugees into the UN High Commissioner for Refugees’ headquarters for appointments Thursday.

Only half jokingly, the security guard at the compound added, “Don’t talk about what Canada is doing too loudly because if these people hear of this, they will go mad. They want to leave here. They ask for this every day.”

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Mustafa Sharawi, who with his wife and six children fled the rebel-occupied Syrian city of Idlib four years ago, said until he was asked about it he had not heard of the Trudeau government’s decision to bring in 25,000 refugees by the end of the year.

“You ask me what I know about Canada and my answer is that I cannot even tell you what Syria is like any more. I had a restaurant there and here we have nothing,” Sharawi said. “I used to sell sweets but had to stop because of high blood pressure. My young sons support us by restocking shelves in a grocery store.”