It is early evening in Amman as Habib settles into the gray couch of his small living room, still wearing his dark Sunday suit. While Christians the world over celebrate the resurrection of Christ, it is a quiet Easter of sweet tea and cookies for Habib and his family - the ninth now they have spent as Iraqi refugees in Jordan.

For Habib - who asked that his last name not be used - this Easter is a reminder both of what he has, and what he has lost. Having escaped Iraq in 1998, five years before the bloodshed that has racked that country since 2003, Habib is thankful for the safety of his family. But with his two oldest sons living in Europe, he cannot help but feel the loss of their absence.

"In Iraq, we spent all of our Easters at my brother's house, with relatives," Habib recalled of the years before war and sanctions began making life in Iraq unbearable. "But we don't have a good Easter here, because my two sons are far from us." A customs clearing agent in Baghdad for ten years, Habib was responsible for applying duty to imports - imports that all but disappeared after sanctions against Iraq took hold in the wake of the 1991 Gulf War.

Aside from shipments of tires and construction materials from other Gulf States, Habib says, there was little in the way of work. "If you haven't any customers, there is no business," Habib said. With conditions steadily worsening in Iraq, and prices rising, his two oldest sons fled to Jordan in 1994. From there they made their way to Denmark two years later, where they now have citizenship. With four other children to care for in Iraq, Habib began planning to leave the country.

"There was not any future for our children there," Habib said. "When any boy finished school, he must go into the army. There were not any jobs for them."

Fleeing Iraq for Jordan two years later, Habib and his family found the first of many apartments they were to call home. Today, they find themselves among the estimated 750,000 Iraqi refugees living in Jordan - some of the two million Iraqis the United Nations estimates have fled since 2003.

Another 1.7 million remain displaced within Iraq, a figure the UN says is likely to climb to 2.3 million by the end of this year. Many fled to Jordan, which along with neighboring Syria has taken in the majority of the refugees. And though this is the largest long-term population movement in the Middle East since the displacement of the Palestinians in 1948, there are no outward signs of the tremendous influx this country of less than six million people has absorbed.

In Jordan, refugees have found homes and apartments and settled into a life of legal limbo, due in large part to increasingly stringent laws which make it nearly impossible for most refugees to gain legal status. "How can I work?" Habib says. "With [whom] can I work? They don't give me any permission to work here." Having overstayed his original six-month entry visa granted to him by the Jordanian authorities, Habib, like most Iraqis here, is now living illegally.

Unable to work, he and his family depend on the odd jobs his son Emile picks up, living constantly with the fear of being deported if he is caught working. Having moved now five times in nine years in search of affordable apartments in decent neighborhoods, it is a life that has taken a toll on Habib. "I sold my home and came here. We lived on that money for awhile," Habib said. "Now we would go to any country, me and my family, to live in peace, not war."

Some agencies are working to help, among them Caritas Jordan, which runs an informal school for Iraqi refugees, as well as a community clinic. Habib's youngest son, Fadi, receives some money from Caritas Jordan to cover a portion of his school fees and expenses - part of an overall effort by Caritas to link refugees back into a social network most of them have been denied since they left Iraq.

But the need is outpacing the ability of agencies to keep up. Though he has applied for refugee status from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, Habib says he has not heard back, other than receiving a card saying his status is being reviewed. That was four years ago.

His 29-year-old son Emile, who was in his first year of art school in Iraq when the family fled, sums up the frustration he feels at not being allowed to work and live legally in Jordan. "Here in this country we lost everything," Emile said, "We lost our country, we lost our studies, we lost our lives. For me, this and prison are the same."

Back in the quiet confines of their living room, Habib and his family see Europe as the answer to their prayers. With Iraq still torn by violence, there seems little hope for peace. Unable to work in Jordan, neither Habib nor his three sons see a future here. Denmark is the dream they all share, a place that would not only free them from the limbo of Jordan, but also reunite them as the family they have not been for more than a decade.

"We don't need anything else," said Habib's wife Mary, "But to be with our sons."