460 Killed in Horrific Massacre in Sudan Hospital, WHO Says, Amid RSF Takeover
Approximately 460 patients and their companions were killed in a horrific massacre at a hospital in el-Fasher, Sudan, on Tuesday, the UN reports, amid a takeover of the North Darfur capital by Rapid Support Forces (RSF) this week.
The casualties are among the 2,000 people estimated by Sudanese officials to have been killed since the paramilitary group’s takeover of the city on Sunday.
The hospital massacre took place at Saudi Maternity Hospital, per World Health Organization (WHO) Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who said he was “appalled and deeply shocked” at the massacre. The agency said that it has verified 285 attacks on health care in Sudan, including at least 1,204 killings of health care workers and patients, since the beginning of the civil war in 2023.
Sudan’s military has confirmed that it has withdrawn from el-Fasher, the result of an 18-month siege for control of the city. This marks a drastic shift in the war as the city housed the Sudanese military’s last major positions in Darfur.
Sudan Doctors Network said that RSF fighters entered the hospital and killed everyone they found inside, executing patients.
“They cold-bloodedly killed everyone they found inside the Saudi Hospital, including patients, their companions, and anyone else present in the wards. Hospitals in El Fasher have been transformed into human slaughterhouses at the hands of the RSF, who make no distinction between combatant and patient, or between child and doctor,” the group said.
One video filmed by an RSF fighter, per Al Jazeera, showed fighters inside the hospital surrounded by dead bodies. One of the victims begins to rise up, and a fighter swiftly executes them.
The group’s spokesperson, Tasneem Al-Amin, said that the massacres across the city are “a true genocide based on ethnicity” and condemned the international community for failing to take action on the “systematic campaign of killing and extermination.” “The massacres the world is witnessing today are an extension of what occurred in El Fasher more than a year and a half ago, when over 14,000 civilians were killed through bombing, starvation, and extrajudicial executions,” Al-Amin said in a statement.
The UN’s migration agency says that roughly 35,000 people have fled al-Fasher since Sunday as RSF fighters unleashed violence.
“It was like a killing field,” a witness, Tajal-Rahman, told The Associated Press. “Bodies everywhere and people bleeding and no one to help them.”
AP reported that witnesses said fighters were going door to door shooting and beating people. Satellite imagery of the city analyzed by Yale University researchers found evidence of mass killings, showing streets lined with piles of bodies and large pools of blood and imagery “consistent with “door-to-door clearance operations.”
The UN Human Rights office said in a report on Monday that civilians are being executed for trying to flee the violence, “with indications of ethnic motivations for killings.”
“Multiple distressing videos received by UN Human Rights show dozens of unarmed men being shot or lying dead, surrounded by RSF fighters who accuse them of being [Sudan Armed Forces] fighters,” the office said.
The massacre comes as reports say the United Arab Emirates is increasing its supply of weapons to the RSF, even after the U.S. formally accused RSF and allied militias of committing genocide in Sudan.
Lawmakers called for the U.S. to take action against the UAE for its backing of the slaughter.
“We must do everything in our power to stop this genocide, including cutting off all weapons sales to the United Arab Emirates who are arming and funding this ethnic cleansing,” said Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Michigan).
“There is evidence the UAE backed RSF is engaged in mass murder in El-Fasher in Darfur. Why is the U.S. allowing the UAE — which we fund militarily — help the brutal RSF engage in mass atrocity?” wrote Sen. Chris Murphy (D-Connecticut). “FYI — this isn’t just about Trump — the Biden Admin was letting this happen too.”