We are all civilians."We don't do anything bad."The Gaza arrivals are only one flashpoint in a system being squeezed from several directions at once.At the centre of that system is Australia's Humanitarian Program — the 20,000-place annual allocation that serves as the country's main avenue for offering refugees a permanent home.In the decade to mid-2024, the program accounted for 6.6 per cent of Australia's net overseas migration.Refugees can reach Australia by other means — through skilled-work or family visas, community sponsorship, or, in rare cases, ministerial intervention — but these largely sit outside the capped humanitarian intake, leaving the 20,000 places as the main measure of Australia's annual refugee commitment.Those places are split three ways: refugees referred from overseas by the United Nations refugee agency on the basis of protection need, refugees sponsored by communities already in Australia, and people granted permanent protection onshore after being found to have refugee status That never came.Decades on, in the Sydney suburb where the now 73-year-old has settled in retirement, residents fought to stop a mosque being built.He hears today's debate — the talk of values, of who belongs — and finds it familiar."It does concern me that we're going to see this happening again," he says."To see governments now changing their policy and the values they had, all for the sake of votes — it is sad."At the heart of Australia's immigration framework sits a question that has never really changed: who gets to stay, and who is left waiting.Palestinian Zuhria Al Hattab has reached safety, but not permanency.Of the 18 visas her sister in Australia applied for, only five were granted