World Refugee Day 2026: 117 Million Reasons to Act

Somewhere right now, a child is sleeping in a tent. A mother is learning her third language. A father is rebuilding his sense of purpose in a city he couldn't have named a year ago. 

As of mid-2025, 117.3 million people have been forcibly displaced worldwide; that’s 1 in 67 people with 40% of them being children. World Refugee Day, observed every June 20, exists to honor their strength. At Zakat Foundation of America, it is also a call to deepen our commitment to turning survival into dignity. 

The Human Scale of Displacement 

Nearly two-thirds of the world's refugees come from just five countries: Venezuela, Syria, Ukraine, Afghanistan, and Sudan. Most are hosted not by wealthy nations, but by low- and middle-income countries carrying an outsized burden. 

UNHCR projects 136 million forcibly displaced or stateless people by end of 2026. The need is accelerating. But so is the evidence that when communities show up with the right support, lives are rebuilt. 

A Door That Closed, and Opened Again 

Jamila was born in Muqdisho. For thirteen years, Somalia was home: its language, its people, its rhythms. Then violence made staying impossible, and her family made the only choice they could. 

They left, but not everyone made it. She lost her grandmother and brother before the journey to Kenya even began. 

The refugee camp became her world. “It was difficult,” she says so plainly, without elaboration, the way people do when the full weight of something is too large to explain to a stranger. But inside that world, she found something that felt like herself: school. English, specifically. She loved it. She studied through grade 7 with the kind of determination that doesn't come from ambition alone, but from knowing, somehow, that language is a lifeline. 

Then her mother got sick, and school stopped. 

When she arrived in Chicago, it was winter. She had never felt cold like that. Her resettlement case manager connected her to the Rohingya Cultural Center (RCC), a community space supported by Zakat Foundation of America.  

"I am not Rohingya, and they treat me like everyone else. I love to come to RCC. It is a place for everyone.”  

She found a teacher who understands her. She is learning English again, picking up where a Kenyan refugee camp forced her to stop. 

We’re Serving Refugees Across 14 Countries 

Zakat Foundation of America works in Bangladesh, Chad, Egypt, Ghana, India, Jordan, Kenya, Lebanon, Libya, Moldova, Pakistan, Sudan, Türkiye, and the USA, meeting refugees at every stage of displacement with six core programs: 

• Shelter and Safety — emergency housing, food, medical care, and case management 

• Resettlement and Belonging — legal aid, healthcare navigation, and cultural orientation 

• Education and Skills Training — English classes, tutoring, vocational training, and citizenship prep 

• Livelihoods and Self-Reliance — job placement, entrepreneurship support, and employer partnerships 

• Women and Family Strengthening — childcare, leadership programs, counseling, and parenting support 

• Community and Cultural Belonging — cultural centers and events that preserve identity and build connection 

The principle across all of it is the same: dignity before dependency. We don’t just respond to crisis; we invest in the futures refugees are already building for themselves. 

This World Refugee Day, Choose Action 

117.3 million people remain without a safe place to call home. The stories behind that number- the grandmother who didn't make it out of Somalia, the child who stopped school in grade 7, the woman who found warmth in a Chicago classroom- belong to all of us. 

At Zakat Foundation of America, solidarity is not a sentiment. It is a program, a classroom, a community that says: you belong here, too.