Tens of thousands of Sudanese civilians are streaming into the besieged city of El Obeid, capital of North Kordofan state, as fighting between the Sudanese army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) escalates across the surrounding region. Al Jazeera reported from the ground on Sunday that more than 5,000 families arrived in the city in just the past week alone, fleeing RSF raids on outlying villages.

The new arrivals add to a humanitarian catastrophe that has been building for months. According to the International Organization for Migration, more than 200,000 people have been newly displaced across Kordofan since fighting intensified late last year, with displacement in El Obeid's own Sheikan district surging 25 percent over eight months. RSF fighters have raided villages such as Um Dareisa and Al-Shaqla, roughly 40 kilometers southwest of the city, killing civilians and torching homes before survivors make the trek into what aid workers now call one of the most overcrowded and dangerous cities in Sudan. A prewar population of roughly 750,000 has ballooned to an estimated 3.4 million.

A city under relentless drone fire

El Obeid's swelling population is trapped inside a siege that has turned the city into a near-daily target. RSF drones — sometimes in waves of up to 40 at a time, according to data from the International NGO Safety Organisation — have knocked out El Obeid's main power transformer and repeatedly struck water infrastructure, according to reporting by UN News. Residents describe rationing drinking water while a cholera outbreak spreads through crowded neighborhoods and makeshift shelters.

The stakes go beyond infrastructure. UN investigators have warned publicly that El Obeid risks becoming a repeat of el-Fasher, the Darfur city where RSF fighters killed an estimated 6,000 civilians last year in atrocities that UN investigators concluded bore "the hallmarks of genocide." El Obeid sits on a strategic corridor linking the capital Khartoum to Sudan's western Darfur region, making it a prize both sides are unwilling to give up.

"THE WARNING SIGNS ARE IMPOSSIBLE TO IGNORE. ACROSS SUDAN, FAMILIES ARE FLEEING VIOLENCE, LOSING ACCESS TO WATER, ELECTRICITY AND HEALTHCARE." — Amy Pope, Director General, International Organization for Migration

Sudan's civil war, now in its fourth year since erupting in 2023 out of a power struggle between army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan and RSF commander Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, has displaced an estimated 14 million people nationwide and killed roughly 59,000, though rights groups say the true toll is likely far higher given how little independent verification is possible in active conflict zones. Aid agencies report soaring rates of sexual violence against women and girls fleeing through contested territory, and children now make up a disproportionate share of arrivals — nearly 39,000 arrived in El Obeid in the first six months of this year alone.

Humanitarian access remains the central obstacle. Aid convoys attempting to reach El Obeid along the road from Khartoum have themselves come under RSF drone fire, with strikes reported on army escort vehicles, oil tankers and cargo trucks. That has left aid groups struggling to feed and treat a population several times the city's prewar size, even as fresh arrivals continue to walk in by the thousand.

With no ceasefire talks currently active between Khartoum and the RSF's parallel government, and both sides digging in around Kordofan's strategic towns, aid officials say the coming weeks will determine whether El Obeid can avoid the mass-casualty scenario UN investigators have been warning about since early summer. For now, the city's swelling camps and darkened streets offer the clearest sign yet of how close that warning may be to becoming reality.