It isn’t only killings that drive people away, said Adnan Salem Dawood, 46, who lived in an area that was never seized by the Islamic State. He was driven away by Shiite militia members after they had defeated the militants elsewhere, and he has spent the past year living in a tent in the Qura Tu camp.

“They come to your house at night and ask you silly questions, like, ‘Do you know this man? Do you know that man?’ ” he said. “They beat you in front of your wife and children till the blood pours from your mouth and you are humiliated. They don’t tell you honestly to leave. What they do is make your life miserable so that you are grateful to leave.”

“I don’t like living here, but I can’t go back,” he added. “We don’t have any future in Iraq.”

Kareem Nouri, spokesman for the Badr Organization, the largest Shiite military group in Diyala, which also controls the provincial government, acknowledged the problems. But he denied that there is any deliberate attempt to displace Sunnis from the province or from any other part of Iraq.

If Sunnis are being refused permission to return home, it is because their villages or towns are near battle zones and aren’t safe, or because they or their families are suspected of affiliation with the Islamic State, he said.

If some are being squeezed out again by threats or violence, it is because of tribal problems that are beyond the capacity of the Badr Organization or the central government to solve. “There is revenge taking place between tribes. There are individuals who are seeking revenge, but they only represent themselves,” he said. “There are some Shiite gangs, but they don’t have our support, and we reject them.”

“The Sunnis are the ones who have been harmed most by ISIS, and they will never be deceived again,” Nouri said. “We know we can’t push the Sunnis aside. ISIS has united us all.”

But don’t look at Diyala, he urged. “Look at Tikrit. Tikrit is a success. It is a success because we managed to reach an understanding with the people of the city. We expelled the terrorist elements, and we didn’t allow them back.”