Sudan Media Forum
October 25, 2025 EL FASHER (Sudan Tribune) – “Two days ago, I buried two of my sisters and my son, who were killed in the shelling. I have no one left to stand by me,” says Fatima Hamed, 75, fighting back tears. “I am living in hell, now responsible for the ten children of the son I lost. I swear to God, we haven’t eaten in three days. Sometimes I collapse from hunger.”
In the silent streets of El Fasher, the moans of the hungry drown out all other sounds. Frail children sleep on empty stomachs while mothers weep, helpless to feed them. In a city exhausted by siege and consumed by famine, kitchens are bare, and slow death has become a constant guest.
Since early October, tens of thousands of residents in El Fasher, the capital of North Darfur, have been completely cut off as a brutal siege, in place for over a year and a half, has tightened its grip. No reliable statistics exist for the total number of civilians trapped inside.
The Rapid Support Forces (RSF) have finished constructing massive earthen ramparts around the city, severing all routes once used to smuggle food. As a result, markets are empty of basic goods, and the prices of what little remains have soared beyond anyone’s reach.
Women, children, and the elderly are suffering the most. Many go days without food, and the signs of emaciation and severe malnutrition are visible across the city. As their weakened bodies fail, fears of an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe are growing.
With aid cut off and access to the city nearly impossible, residents fear El Fasher will become a “silent mass grave.” According to activists in humanitarian response rooms who spoke to Sudan Tribune, indiscriminate shelling and drone strikes by the RSF kill between five and seven people every day.
With each passing day, hopes for food or an end to the siege fade, as the armed conflict continues to devour what little life is left in the city.
Hides are the last thing left for the living
Under the suffocating RSF siege, civilian life in El Fasher has become a daily struggle for survival. With markets destroyed and supply lines cut, residents face a famine so severe it has driven some to eat animal hides. They clean and burn the skins just to have something to quell the pain of hunger.
The RSF has systematically destroyed markets, most recently shelling the “Abu Qurun” station market with a drone in late September, killing dozens of civilians. Their forces also destroyed small shops in the “First Class” neighborhood and killed several merchants in a clear move to choke off all sources of goods.
Slow death and cruel hunger
Embodying the scale of the disaster, Fatima Hamed continued her story, her voice trembling as she wept for her lost children. “I live in a tent made of sacks as shells fall around us. Hunger is killing us. The community kitchens have stopped, and even the ambaz (animal fodder) is gone,” she tells Sudan Tribune. “There is nothing to eat. I have tied my stomach shut from hunger. I have gone blind and can no longer walk.”
Fatima concluded with a desperate appeal to the world: “The hunger is so bad I can’t even attempt to flee; I’m afraid I’ll die on the road. I appeal to everyone to help us. People are already dying of starvation. Save who is left. Save my grandchildren before they die too.”
A wounded mother and hungry children
Fatima’s plight mirrors that of countless women like Mariam Yahya, a mother of four now living in a shelter. She lost her home and was wounded by shrapnel while escaping southern El Fasher. “My legs are broken, I can’t walk, and I have nothing,” she tells Sudan Tribune. “My children haven’t eaten in days. Their father has been missing for two months. We don’t know if he is alive or dead.”
Mariam’s ordeal is a snapshot of the suffering of thousands of women facing starvation and terror in shelters that have nothing left to give.
An imminent humanitarian catastrophe
According to Mohammed Ibrahim Nekruma, coordinator of the “Allah Yabradi” volunteer initiative, the situation in El Fasher has reached “complete collapse.” He confirms that relentless shelling and the destruction of markets, hospitals, and shelters have brought civilian life to a halt. “Thousands of civilians are trapped without food or medicine,” he says. “Even the community kitchens that fed people have closed. Some were forced to eat animal fodder, but now even that has run out, and its price has skyrocketed.”
Mohammed al-Khair al-Rifai, supervisor of the “Takiya and Suqia Matbakh al-Khair” kitchen, says they have been forced to cook meals from ambaz starch due to the absence of basic goods. He calls the prices “insane”: a sack of millet or sorghum costs around 18 million Sudanese pounds (approx. $5,000), a kilogram of rice is 500,000 pounds, a kilogram of powdered milk exceeds 480,000 pounds, and a small box of matches costs 20,000 pounds.
A distress call
Caught between destruction and starvation, the civilians of El Fasher are living a silent tragedy that the world is failing to hear. The cries of Fatima, Mariam, and countless others are the voice of a community being pushed to the brink of annihilation.
This is not just a food crisis; it is a full-blown humanitarian catastrophe demanding urgent international intervention to save the lives that remain before the city itself becomes a mass grave.
The Sudan Media Forum and its member institutions are publishing this article, prepared by Sudan Tribune, to document the escalating humanitarian tragedy in El Fasher. Residents are living under a suffocating siege by the Rapid Support Forces that has lasted over a year and a half. The destruction of markets and cutting of supply lines have triggered a famine, forcing civilians to eat animal hides—after the fodder ran out—just to survive.
