This will be the third Christmas in Iraq since thousands of Iraqi Christians fled their homes in Nineveh Plain and elsewhere to escape from Islamic State.

Many of their towns and villages have now been liberated.

But across Iraq there are now fewer than 150,000 Christians in a nation where as recently as 2003 they numbered 1.6 million.

And for those that have been able to return to their homes, they have in many cases found them destroyed or uninhabitable.

One woman in her forties, Khalida, who fled Qaraqosh for a tent, then a portacabin and more recently a house in Erbil, told the Christian charity Open Doors UK that she and others had celebrated when her home town was liberated. "But my joy only lasted one day. Then I found out that my house had been burned completely, just like the houses of the rest of my family. I wanted to return to my city. But now I ask myself: where will I return to? I have no house anymore."

So she and her family will celebrate Christmas once again with other displaced people. "It will be simple. We will make the children feel the spirit of Christmas and go to church. We don't have much, but we do have the most important thing, and that is Christ. We will celebrate with him alone.

"I heard of so many churches that are raising their voice for us. That gives me hope. If I can ask something of the churches worldwide it would be that they help us rebuild our area and help us live in peace there."

Open Doors reports that it is unlikely that families will be able to return to towns such as Qaraqosh until next summer because of the extent of the damage. "There are also areas which have been deliberately made unsafe to prevent Christians from returning home," said the charity which is appealing for help and has created a "rebuilding and returning fund".

One of the first places to benefit will be a centre for support and encouragement in Karamles, a recently liberated Christian village, to be opened later this month.

The aim of the centre is to support Christians as they rebuild their houses by offering them care, food, and places to sleep. "These centres will be the bases where Christians will find the courage and the enthusiasm to rebuild Karamles and the church," local church leader Thabet told Open Doors.

Currently, just soldiers and the clergy are in the liberated Christian villages, according to Juliana Taimoorazy of the Iraqi Christian Relief Council.

"They want to go back and return to their homes and rebuild in the spring.

"I've noticed dedication among the generation after ISIS. Young people want to return and help rebuild it and they want to be equipped to fight," she told Jerusalem Post.

"We think Iraq is like a black whole where people have suffered and will continue to suffer," she added. Her organisation has given financial support for 1,000 children over the Christmas holiday. She hopes the new US administration will help groups such as Assyrian Christians to rebuild their lives in Iraq.