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the Middle East

Golzow mayor Frank Schütz, left, leans over to whisper a question to Rasha Haimoud during a holiday concert. She and her husband, Ahmad Haimoud, are refugees who settled in the small former East German town after escaping the war in their native Syria

Worried about its future, this former East German city recruited Syrian refugees

Education

Compared to the rest of Germany, the economy in the former East Germany has struggled. In the small village of Golzow, the population had shrunk to the point where authorities were considering closing the village’s only elementary school. That’s when the town mayor invited Syrian refugee families to move in.

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