A recent attack on Saudi Hospital in El Fasher has killed at least 13 people and wounded medical staff. Human rights activists have tagged this a calculated, cold-blooded war crime and a definitive new low in the Sudan Civil War. The ruthless shelling by the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) on one of the last functioning health facilities in the besieged city of Darfur is a direct attack on the fundamental laws of armed conflict and on humanity itself.
What this incident has exposed is the RSF’s strategy: to starve, terrorize, and systematically erase the civilian population of El Fasher, the last military stronghold of the Sudanese Army in Darfur. The world’s condemnation is necessary, but without immediate humanitarian solutions, it amounts to conspiracy.
The RSF’s Weaponisation of Starvation and Healthcare
The RSF is using starvation as a weapon of war and systematically destroying all civilian infrastructure. The sealing of the city with a 57-kilometre earthen wall, confirmed by satellite imagery, transforms the siege into an iron grip on El Fasher. This physical barrier is designed to ensure the starvation of hundreds of thousands of trapped civilians by choking off all humanitarian aid convoys. An act that is a clear violation of international law.
By targeting the Saudi Hospital for the second time this year, the RSF has shown its resolute determination to ensure that the wounded, the sick, and the children have no refuge and no chance of survival.
Meanwhile, the reports of arbitrary detentions, sexual violence, and extortion at RSF checkpoints for those attempting to flee paint a picture of ethnically motivated abuses that the UN has repeatedly warned could escalate into genocide in Darfur.
The targeting of non-Arab communities, the destruction of civilian homes, and the calculated destruction of infrastructure, as confirmed by UN bodies, constitute crimes against humanity. The relentless cycle of violence and impunity in Sudan is one of the world’s worst humanitarian catastrophes, and the lack of decisive international action has emboldened the perpetrators, allowing this “war of atrocities” to continue.
