The war the world is struggling to see

On Jul 8, 2026

The UN is warning that a catastrophe is unfolding in el-Obeid, a strategic city in central Sudan.

The chief of the UN Human Rights Council says the city has faced “relentless” drone strikes — and executions, torture, abductions and sexual violence are also on the rise.

This is as the city becomes the latest hotspot in the three-year civil war between the Sudanese Armed Forces and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, or RSF. Noah Taylor, head of Sudan operations for the Norwegian Refugee Council, recently visited El-Obeid and described conditions there as bleak:

“The fear and apprehension is palpable. People are on edge, people are terrified, and people need a break and survival from this war.”

The Humanitarian Research Lab at the Yale School of Public Health has captured satellite imagery of the area. Nathaniel Raymond, the lab’s director, spoke to Host Marco Werman about what the imagery tells us.

Marco Werman: Nathaniel, you’ve been viewing imagery of conditions in el-Obeid. What do the images show?

Nathaniel Raymond: About 30% of the gas stations and fuel reserves have been hit by what we call “suicide” drones or loitering munitions from the Rapid Support Forces. The main power substation has been blown up. Water pumps that give the city potable water are now failing to function due to a lack of electricity and fuel. Why that’s a big deal is that we have 700,000 people; 200,000 of them are displaced persons inside the city, and the risk right now is of a potential cholera outbreak if they don’t have potable water.

Raqiya Abdsalam, who survived a bout of dengue fever, sits at her home in El-Obeid, Sudan on January 23, 2023. A surge in mosquito-borne diseases this winter has shown the fragility of Sudan’s health system, and bodes ill for coming challenges, especially after a 2021 military coup. Marwan Ali/AP/File

Can you put a few more details on that humanitarian crisis? What is going on in terms of what the people in el-Obeid are experiencing?

You have to understand, in terms of the topography of the city, what a siege looks like there from a topographic perspective. It has one road in and one road out, and right now the 5th Division of the Sudan Armed Forces has basically built a wall on the western side to keep out the Rapid Support Forces. Meanwhile, there’s only one way out. If people start to run, we have a real risk of people getting stuck on that back road and creating significant secondary fatalities.

Are humanitarian aid groups able to reach those in need given the limitations of entry and egress?

Well, you’re asking the critical question, Marco. There are about 14 Sudan Army checkpoints on that back road, and while some humanitarian supplies are getting in, we’re seeing significant access problems related to the Sudan Armed Forces’ control of that road. We urgently need increased access to get ready for the worst-case scenario: a cholera outbreak. In war, particularly in East Africa, cholera can kill more people in less time than bombs and bullets.

A Sudanese woman receives an oral cholera vaccine during a 10-day vaccination campaign conducted by health ministry workers in Khartoum, Sudan, Wednesday, Aug. 13, 2025. Marwan Ali/AP/File

So those are the national military controlling the roads, but is it the RSF that’s staging the siege on el-Obeid?

Yes, and right now we’re basically in a hunt to find, from space, where the Rapid Support Forces are. There’s been a lot of talk, including in the warning from High Commissioner Volker Türk at the Human Rights Council that you mentioned, about an imminent attack. Our job is to find out where RSF is positioning. Basically, the city is a funnel, and we need to find out whether RSF is working to cut off the back door out of that funnel.

So geographically, el-Obeid sits almost halfway between the capital, Khartoum, and the far west of Sudan, where Darfur is located. What is the strategic importance of el-Obeid in Sudan’s civil war?

The strategic importance of el-Obeid can’t be overstated. If you capture el-Obeid, you’re capturing the road back to the capital, which the Rapid Support Forces were ejected from in Khartoum and its twin city, Omdurman, in 2025. If they can take el-Obeid, they basically have engaged in a tactical breakthrough that now puts the capital back under threat. And so for both SAF and RSF, el-Obeid is an existential battle because whoever controls that juncture point controls the next phase in terms of tempo and trajectory of the war itself.

A mannequin dressed in military gear and helmet holds a Sudanese flag at a makeshift checkpoint on an empty street in Khartoum — An empty checkpoint where a mannequin dressed as a soldier stands in downtown Khartoum, Sudan, Sunday, April 19, 2026.Bernat Armangue/AP

And the RSF figures: if they attack and conquer and do that to enough cities, can they claim victory?

They are now playing for a draw. And that, just the fear of RSF getting back towards the capital, will have significant consequences for the civilians who are just starting to rebuild their lives.

We saw last year, Nathaniel, in the city of el-Fasher, about 300 miles to the west of el-Obeid, that citizens went through a violent, monthslong siege, repeated attacks and an ensuing humanitarian crisis. How does what’s happening now in el-Obeid compare to that?

The humanitarian conditions in el-Obeid are egregious, some of the worst we’ve seen, and the suffering of the people of el-Obeid should not be understated. However, comparisons between el-Fasher and el-Obeid, unfortunately, I think, miss the mark. el-Fasher was its own nightmare, and that was really the last battle of the Darfur genocide. The goal of RSF was to liquidate, in Rwanda-style killings, the remaining four Nzagawa tribes who were inside the city to capture a homeland for the ethnic group that’s behind the RSF called the Rizeigat. In the case of el-Obeid, those ethnic groups that were present in the genocidal massacre, according to the UN, in el-Fasher are not present in el-Obeid. That said, if RSF were to capture the city, it would look more like the reprisal killings that happened in 2023 in the cities of Nyala and Zalingei, where those who were seen as collaborators with the government were executed.

The crisis is so immense, but it has not received the international media attention given to other crises around the globe. What do people unfamiliar with Sudan’s conflict need to understand today?

They need to understand one thing: this is not a civil war in the simplest sense. It’s a proxy war between the backers of the RSF, which is the United Arab Emirates, and the backers of the national army, the Sudan Armed Forces, which include Turkey, Egypt, and Saudi Arabia. This is a proxy fight for Sudan’s resources and for geopolitical positioning. And this is not a forgotten crisis; it’s a willfully ignored one. The US, the UK and the EU have made a choice that the strategic relationship they have with the United Arab Emirates really matters more than the lives of these people.

A Sudanese soldier in camouflage uniform stands behind a mounted machine gun with a Sudanese flag attached to it — In this AP file photo, Sudanese soldier from the Rapid Support Forces or RSF stands on his vehicle in the East Nile province, Sudan, on June 22, 2019.Hussein Malla/AP/File

I mean, you must have thought about the international bodies or leaders who have the weight to step in and say this needs to stop. So do they exist, and what carrots and sticks could they use to accomplish that?

Well, two weeks ago I was in London testifying to the United Kingdom’s Parliament about the Foreign Office of the UK government’s failure to respond in el-Fasher when we were providing them with intelligence assistance to try to stop that massacre. And really what’s so frustrating here is that this isn’t an episode of “Murder, She Wrote.” We know what’s going to happen. We know what RSF is trying to do. And really the missing integer isn’t information. It’s political will.

You know, Nathaniel, I was struck by something you said earlier, um, something like, “We at the Yale Lab are on the hunt for the Rapid Support Forces.” I mean, it seems that you at Yale should be assisted by other international players. Is it basically just you and the Yale Humanitarian Research Lab doing this work? And how would it change if there were more players? Making clear the map of who’s involved in this war.

Norman Maclean famously said, Marco, “it’s a miracle the universe survives primarily on volunteer help.” Uh, basically, uh, the Yale Humanitarian Research Lab here is John Maclean in “Die Hard” on the 32nd floor of Nakatomi Plaza. We’ve been holding the watch now since the start of the civil war, and while others are involved, this really needs to be a matter for the UN Security Council, not the epidemiology department of Yale.

Parts of this interview have been lightly edited for length and clarity.

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