El-Fasher Has Fallen: Witnessing a Systematic Massacre by the Rapid Support Forces
By: Dr. Abdelnasser Sulum Hamed
For over a year and a half, El-Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, was under a severe siege from all directions: Khartoum, Kabkabiya, Al-Tina, and Nyala. The city was no longer merely an urban center but a fortress of death and destruction. Food and medicine were scarce, markets mostly closed, and hospitals barely operational. Every step on the streets was fraught with danger, and every corner carried the scent of death.
Amid this devastation, nurse Elham recorded the names of the wounded and dead on small scraps of paper. She later said, “We knew the end was near, but we wanted someone to know we were here, and that our names were not erased in the dark. This was our final struggle against oblivion.” Her testimony reflects the resilience of humanity and the attempt to preserve a community’s identity in the face of systematic erasure through violence and terror.
The tragedy began in mid-2023 when the Rapid Support Forces (RSF) cut off major roads, imposing both a psychological and physical siege. The blockade was not solely military but a carefully calculated tactic of starvation. Food and medicine were available only briefly before roads were closed again. Schools closed, health centers deteriorated, and markets vanished. Children were deprived of education and safety; families struggled to obtain basic sustenance, while the elderly and sick were trapped between illness and siege preventing treatment.
Despite the darkness, residents tried to endure. Women baked the few remaining grains in the dark, youth buried the dead at night, and children adapted as best they could. Some survivors hid in waterlogged, filthy basements as RSF troops attempted to storm buildings. A witness from Zaki neighborhood recalled, “We heard gunfire from all directions and breathed the dust of death in every corner. Every day felt like surviving chaos that never ends.”
Densely populated neighborhoods – Al-Thawra, Al-Faisal, Al-Zaki, Al-Tina, and the Airport area – were systematically destroyed. Thousands of families sought refuge in basements or temporary shelters, sleeping on cold floors amid sand and debris. Children slept among ruins, women baked what little grain remained to feed neighbors, while fear and helplessness prevailed.
On the morning of October 26, 2025, the situation escalated into an open catastrophe. Intensive artillery shelling targeted residential neighborhoods and the airport, accompanied by drone attacks and a complete cut in communications and electricity, including Starlink. Satellite images showed the sand around the city had turned red due to bloodshed, a stark indicator of the massacre’s scale.
Reliable sources documented the casualties:
– 460 people inside El-Fasher Saudi Hospital.
– Over 1,230 fatalities according to the UN, noting that this may represent only part of the reality.
– Estimated total deaths: approximately 2,000 based on satellite imagery and video footage.
– More than 60 families obliterated while attempting to flee.
– Family (N.M.) lost 27 members in executions along the Khartoum road.
– Over 150 women or girls subjected to sexual violence.
– More than 200 patients lost their lives in the Saudi Teaching Hospital.
– Over 30 military personnel arrested alive, later shown dead, including the Joint Forces spokesperson holding the rank of Colonel, a blatant violation of Common Article 3 of the Geneva Conventions.
The violence was not random but part of a strategic plan to achieve political, military, and economic objectives. Controlling the city ensures dominance over supply lines and movement of civilians and armed groups. Being an administrative and cultural center, its destruction sent a clear message that resistance would meet systematic violence.
Economically, the city and surrounding areas host illegal gold mines and weapons smuggling routes, directly funding RSF operations. Socially, the attack aimed to dismantle the civilian structure through prolonged siege, executions, and systematic sexual violence, weakening any capacity for organization and resistance.
Militarily, El-Fasher was a resistance zone for joint forces; eliminating civilians and combatants while occupying the city weakened morale and hampered future military recovery. The attack served dual purposes: territorial control and psychological terror, consolidating RSF’s military and political influence while enforcing total submission.
Children, women, and the elderly endured immense psychological pressure, deprived of food and water, constantly fearing shelling and executions. A survivor said: “I saw my neighbor killed in front of me, and my children hid under tables. I could not believe the world could leave us to perish like this.” A former doctor at the Saudi Hospital added, “We lost over 200 patients in a single day. The numbers are large, but fear and panic surpass any statistic.”
For the first time in my life, I felt a strange internal collapse—a mixture of pain, distress, and helplessness—while listening to survivors. Every number represents a destroyed life, every family lost, every child deprived of a future.
According to international humanitarian law, these actions constitute war crimes and crimes against humanity under Common Article 3 and Protocol 54 of the Geneva Conventions. Starvation as a weapon, field executions, and attacks on medical facilities are blatant violations, putting the perpetrators under international accountability.
This article was prepared after listening to survivors who reached safe areas, verifying their testimonies through multiple sources, and updating figures according to UN and credible humanitarian organizations. Numbers remain subject to increase due to restricted access and independent verification within El-Fasher.
El-Fasher stands as a scar on humanity; the world must ensure that silence does not become complicity.
Dr. Abdelnasser Sulum Hamed
Senior Researcher and Director of the East Africa & Sudan Program, FOx Research – Sweden
Researcher in Crisis Management & Counter-Terrorism