Najem al-Moussa was delighted when news of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's overthrow first beamed from the television in his tiny Athens apartment. Then came a dreaded thought: what if Assad's fall meant he and his family would be forced to return to the devastated country they had fled nine years before?

Nearly a decade after he arrived in Germany from Syria and took a selfie with then-Chancellor Angela Merkel, Anas Modamani has finished his university studies and has a German passport. He’s less positive about some German politicians’ reactions to the fall of Bashar Assad,