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The volunteer nurse Nawal Khalil had been serving as a nurse over a three-year period within the South El Fasher hospital after the city fell seized last Sunday by the Rapid Support Forces (RSF). She was occupied with patient care, among them an older female patient in need of a transfusion, when the offensive started.

“Six injured soldiers were killed plus civilian patients in their beds – some of them women,” she says. “The outcome remains unknown for my remaining patients. I needed to escape as they invaded the hospital.”

Khalil, 27, was hit by a bullet in her right foot and upper leg as RSF fighters took control of the adjacent military command center. She ran from the urban area and walked for a day, hurt and lacking sustenance, to get to the settlement of Garney. “Along the route, they took my phone and currency,” she explains. “I ended up with nothing.”

Over a thousand individuals – comprising women and children – traveled on foot for two days to arrive at Tawila town located in northern Darfur after fleeing El Fasher, which was captured following an 18-month blockade.

The town of Tawila, about 34 miles (55km) west away from El Fasher, remains under the authority of the SLA-AW group commanded by Abdul Wahid Mohamed al-Nur.

This past Tuesday, the collaborative Joint Forces – that cooperate with the Sudanese army – accused the RSF with murdering over 2,000 civilians after the city's capture. United Nations officials stated there were videos showing “dozens of unarmed men being shot or lying dead, surrounded by RSF fighters.”

Background Context

Hostilities commenced within Khartoum back on April 15, 2023 as a growing contest for power involving the two key groups within the military government ultimately became violent.

From one perspective exist the official Sudanese army, which maintain general loyalty to General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the nation's actual leader. Challenging him stand the paramilitary forces of the RSF paramilitary group, an assembly of militia groups which support the ex-warlord Gen Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, known as Hemedti.

The Rapid Support Forces were first created by the ex-dictator Omar al-Bashir himself as an Arab anti-rebellion militia named the Janjaweed, which soon became linked with widespread atrocities. Back in 2013, Bashir converted the organization to become the RSF, deploying them to crush a fresh rebellion in southern Darfur.

The conflict has plunged Sudan into among the most severe humanitarian crises in recent history”, as per UN representatives. It has created the planet's biggest displacement catastrophe, scattering more than 10 million people within the country plus 4 million who escaped to adjacent nations, creating increasing strain on Chad and South Sudan.

Present Circumstances

According to witnesses, thousands more civilians stay confined by RSF forces and allied militias within Garney, southwest from El Fasher. Many are former soldiers from the Sudanese army, the allied Joint Forces and other militant organizations that had been fighting alongside the army. They are reportedly being held as they lack funds for ransom demands of between 5m and 10m Sudanese pounds (around six to twelve thousand pounds), per those who escaped who arrived in Tawila. Those unable to pay have been held for multiple days, and occasionally let go solely after developing critical health conditions.

Reports suggest the SLA-AW has authorized army soldiers running from El Fasher to access Tawila provided they give up their weapons.

The individual Adam Yagoub, 28, a chauffeur from Sennar from central Sudanese regions, narrowly escaped being killed after being captured by three armed men mounted on camels close to Garney.

“They intended to behead me using a knife,” he recounts, exhibiting his limb, which one militant assaulted with the butt of an AK-47 rifle. “Then one of them recognised me – his sibling had collaborated with me – and pleaded with them to spare me. Our group contained 18 individuals who departed El Fasher collectively, however just eight arrived in Tawila. I think the others are dead.”

Yagoub states he saw 22 bodies in proximity to what he termed a fraudulent water source utilized by RSF forces and partner armed groups between Garney and Tawila. “It represents a trap,” he says. “Individuals travel all day lacking water, and when they reach it, the armed groups lie in wait. They killed 22 men there and removed the corpses to obscure them.”

An additional nurse who fled the El Fasher South medical facility after the attack on Sunday stated RSF combatants came in using one doorway and commenced firing upon patients within the emergency department, murdering no less than eight. “We ran out via another entrance, but they hit me on the head using a rifle,” he states.

In a video statement last Wednesday, the head of the RSF, General Dagalo, known as Hemedti, declared that any fighter or official who breached the rights of any individual would face consequences.

Numerous individuals who fled from El Fasher passed hours taking cover close to army artillery positions before fleeing west during nighttime. Families already uprooted from Abu Shouk camp in the city had to displace once more, seeking refuge in the Daraja Oula neighbourhood before finally moving toward Tawila.

Individuals seized by the RSF in Garney were apparently provided {water mixed with flour|flour