Hassan Saber Jumaa, a senior administrator who previously worked at the Zamzam displacement camp in Sudan, recently sat in a modest home in Omdurman attempting to recall visual records of the settlement. He searched his mobile device for images of the camp, located near el-Fasher in North Darfur, but found no photographs. Jumaa explained that his previous phone was taken during the Rapid Support Forces attack on the camp in 2025. He noted that his remaining connection to the place is held entirely in his personal memories of the residents and the community structure.
Established in 2004, Zamzam served as a long-term refuge for people displaced by the Darfur conflict that began in 2003. It formed a significant part of a larger cluster of displaced populations alongside the Abu Shouk and al-Salam camps. Jumaa remembered the camp as a vibrant society where daily markets operated and children attended schools. This sense of normalcy persisted until the current Sudanese war erupted in 2023, bringing renewed violence to the region.
The Rapid Support Forces, engaged in combat with the Sudanese Armed Forces and allied groups, captured Zamzam in April 2025 following a prolonged series of attacks. By August 2024, famine conditions had already been confirmed within the camp. Mukhtar Musa, a survivor of the assault, observed the gradual decline of the community due to strict movement restrictions on goods. These limitations depleted food supplies to such an extent that some residents resorted to consuming animal feed and peanut shells.
Umm Kulthum Ali Saleh described the months preceding the final offensive as the most difficult period of her life. The siege prevented essential supplies from entering the camp, forcing Saleh to search for food every morning. She recalled seeing other women boiling grass and mixing mud with flour to create bread. Saleh believes the blockade was a strategic move intended to weaken the population before the final military push.
On April 11, 2025, the Rapid Support Forces initiated a three-day assault using vehicles, camels, and horses. During the attack, straw homes and health facilities were burned. A report from the United Nations Human Rights Office documented the deaths of at least 1,013 civilians. Of these victims, 319 were summarily executed in various locations, including homes, markets, schools, clinics, and mosques. The report also recorded instances of sexual violence, including rape and sexual slavery, which disproportionately targeted the Zaghawa community.
Musa witnessed several mass killings and reported seeing fighters kill civilians while chanting religious slogans. He described bodies scattered near the main market and schools, with fighters continuing to pursue civilians along the roads leading out of the camp. Saleh also remembered the aftermath, noting that roads were littered with bodies while only livestock, such as chickens, donkeys, and sheep, wandered through the abandoned structures.
The violence displaced tens of thousands of people from Zamzam. Many remained in the el-Fasher area, while others fled south to Tawila and Dar al-Salam. The conflict intensified in the following months, with the Rapid Support Forces launching an attack on el-Fasher in August 2025 and capturing the Abu Shouk camp. The UN Human Rights Office stated that at least 40 displaced people were killed and 19 injured inside Abu Shouk, while the International Organization for Migration reported that at least 500 residents fled that day.
El-Fasher itself fell to the Rapid Support Forces on October 26, 2025. More than 6,000 people are believed to have been killed in the city and on escape routes. The UN found that fighters targeted civilians, including members of non-Arab communities, in acts constituting war crimes. While the Rapid Support Forces have previously denied targeting civilians in Zamzam and el-Fasher, they acknowledged that some abuses occurred. Survivors from these areas are now focused on bearing witness to the tragedy, with Musa stating that whoever survives must tell the story of what happened.
Jumaa views the destruction of Zamzam not as an ending, but as the beginning of a new wave of displacement. For him and other survivors, the camp continues to exist in the collective memory of those who once lived there, even as they are now scattered across different locations. The shared trauma and the need to document the events remain central to the lives of those who endured the siege and the subsequent military offensive.
