A bus moves a migrant family to a government-built camps during a police operation at a makeshift refugee camp at the Greek-Macedonian border near the northern Greek village of Idomeni, Tuesday, May 24, 2016. Greek authorities began an operation at dawn Tuesday to gradually evacuate the country's largest informal refugee camp of Idomeni on the Macedonian border, blocking access to the area and sending in more than 400 riot police. (AP Photo/Giannis Papanikos)
A bus moves a migrant family to a government-built camps during a police operation at a makeshift refugee camp at the Greek-Macedonian border near the northern Greek village of Idomeni, Tuesday, May 24, 2016. Greek authorities began an operation at dawn Tuesday to gradually evacuate the country's largest informal refugee camp of Idomeni on the Macedonian border, blocking access to the area and sending in more than 400 riot police. (AP Photo/Giannis Papanikos) Credit: Giannis Papanikos

Idomeni, Greece — It grew to the size of a small town, becoming a symbol of Europe’s closed border policy for migrants and refugees. On Tuesday, Greek authorities began to dismantle it.

Starting at dawn, police moved more than 2,000 people out of Idomeni, the sprawling makeshift camp on the Greek-Macedonian border, and sent in bulldozers to begin erasing the tent city.

The move definitively dashed the dreams of the thousands who had camped there for months in the hope of eventually being able to reach the continent’s wealthy heartland.

The refugees — many from Syria and Iraq — had stubbornly resisted government efforts to leave the site voluntarily, braving torrential rainfall and winter weather.

On Tuesday, they were placed on buses and taken to newly built shelters set up by the army and local authorities as the government promised to clear the site of the remaining 6,500 people over the next week.

More than 700 police officers were deployed in the operation. Authorities posted helicopter footage of the evacuation on the Internet, but journalists were banned from approaching the site.

Emad Hawary, a 50-year-old Syrian, fled on foot with his wife and two daughters to avoid being transported out.

“The police were everywhere and it was quite scary,” he said after seeking refuge at a nearby gas station. “We don’t want to go to a shelter. It’s just another field.”

Hawary said the family still is determined to reach northern Europe and their son, who is already in Germany.

The prospects of that happening are dim, however.

At its peak, when Macedonia shut its border in March, the camp housed more than 14,000, but numbers have declined as people began accepting authorities’ offers of alternative places to stay.

Most were living in small tents pitched in fields and along railroad tracks, or in large marquee-style tents set up by aid agencies to help house people. Greek authorities regularly sent in cleaning crews and provided portable toilets, but conditions were precarious at best, with heavy rain creating muddy ponds.

Recently the camp had begun taking on an image of semi-permanence, with refugees setting up small makeshift shops selling everything from cooking utensils to falafel and bread.