Why the feud between two Sudanese military leaders caught the world by surprise

1 / 5
Gen. Abdel Fattah Al- Burhan, right, and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, left, attending a ceremony in Khartoum on August 17, 2019, during which they signed a "constitutional declaration" that paved the way for a transition to civilian rule. (AFP)
Short Url
Updated 01 May 2023
Follow

Why the feud between two Sudanese military leaders caught the world by surprise

  • Tension had been brewing between Al-Burhan and Hemedti, yet few outsiders sensed the depth of their mutual mistrust
  • Some Sudanese think the international community and aid agencies ought to have anticipated the eventual falling-out

ROME: Although Sudan has been in the throes of political turmoil since authoritarian leader Omar Al-Bashir was toppled in 2019, the sudden explosion of violence that began on April 15 appeared to catch the world by surprise.

Explosions and gunfire in the capital Khartoum and elsewhere across the country, in defiance of repeated attempts to broker a cease-fire, have forced nations to hastily extract embassy staff and citizens who were at risk of being caught in the crossfire.

However, for many Sudanese citizens now forced to decide whether to remain in their homes, deprived of basic utilities, with food and medicine dwindling, or risk their lives by taking one of the increasingly lawless roads out of the country, signs of the coming crisis were all too clear.

Clashes between the Sudanese Armed Forces, led by the country’s de-facto ruler General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, and a paramilitary group, the Rapid Support Forces, led by Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, also known as Hemedti, stem from plans to incorporate the latter into the regular army.

Tensions between the two men over the plan, which formed part of the democratic transition framework, had been growing for months, yet many in the international community appeared to have failed to sense the depth of their mutual mistrust — and were consequently blindsided.




Gen. Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan, ;eft, and his archrival, Gen. Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo. (AFP photos)

“This is the worst of worst-case scenarios,” Volker Perthes, the UN special representative to Sudan, told colleagues during a virtual meeting shortly after the violence began. “We tried even with last-ditch diplomacy ... and we have failed.”

Sudanese fighter jets have continued to pound paramilitary positions in Khartoum in recent days, while deadly fighting and looting have flared in the troubled Darfur region, despite the army and the RSF agreeing to extend a cease-fire deal.

More than 75,000 people have fled their homes to escape the fighting, according to the UN’s International Organization for Migration, while tens of thousands have crossed into neighboring countries including Chad, Egypt, Ethiopia and South Sudan.

Many Sudanese say that foreign powers and international aid agencies should have been far better prepared for the likelihood of the feud between the two generals escalating into armed conflict and for the consequent humanitarian emergency.

“Hemedti and Al-Burhan are ready to fight to the death,” said Sudanese political cartoonist and writer Khalid Albaih.

Albaih, who has performed advocacy work for artists and creatives in Sudan, believes Sudanese could sense in recent months that the situation was reaching a breaking point.




Khalid Albaih

“Everyone saw it coming. Everyone knew something was going to happen soon,” he told Arab News. “The army was building defenses and the janjaweed leader (Hemedti) was moving into the city. You could feel the tension. There was no money in the country except for the money in Hemedti’s hands.”

Albaih calls what is happening now a “delayed war.”

“The international aid organizations were moving forward, pitting the two together more for stability in the country than for actual democracy,” he said.

“This is what is unsettling. We (the Sudanese public) have been fighting for peace for years and still we haven’t found a seat at the table. It seems like the message was to get a gun and you’ll get a seat at the table.”




Sudanese pro-democracy activists had been demonstrating for the reinstatement of Abdalla Hamdok, the prime minister ousted in the October 2021 military coup, to no avail. (AFP file)

The counterargument of course is that there were no “early warning” signs of a dramatic and violent falling-out. Proponents of this theory say that while an escalation was always a possibility — perhaps inevitable even — the international community was completely wrong-footed by the scale and ferocity of the feud.

“I think the criticism is misplaced,” Martin Plaut, senior research fellow at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, told Arab News. “Yes, there was tension between Al-Burhan and Hemedti, but it could have gone on for another 18 months and just fizzled out, or it could have exploded, and it exploded. But you can’t predict when that’s going to happen.”




Martin Plaut

The real problem, said Plaut, “is that Hemedti had forces large enough to counter the Sudanese army directly, and the army was aware of this. As the African saying goes, you can’t have two balls in the field. The monopoly of force, which is supposed to be the right of the army, was just no longer going to hold.”

However, at least one prominent diplomat has acknowledged that foreign powers might have contributed to the crisis by bestowing legitimacy on both Al-Burhan and Hemedti, while turning a blind eye to their obvious antipathy toward one another and their reluctance to cooperate.

In an op-ed for The Washington Post, Jeffrey Feltman, the former US special envoy for the Horn of Africa, called the conflict “sadly predictable” given the West’s willingness to pander to both Sudanese strongmen.




Jeffrey Feltman

“We avoided exacting consequences for repeated acts of impunity that might have otherwise forced a change in calculus,” he wrote. “Instead, we reflexively appeased and accommodated the two warlords. We considered ourselves pragmatic. Hindsight suggests wishful thinking to be a more accurate description.”

Both Al-Burhan and Hemedti began their careers in the killing fields of Darfur, where a tribal rebellion descended into ethnic cleansing during the early 2000s.




ohamed Hamdan Daglo (Hemeti), right, rose from the ranks of the Janjaweed militia that figured in former strongman Omar Al-Bashir's ethnic cleansing campaign in southern Darfur about 20 years ago. (AFP photos)

After the fall of Al-Bashir in 2019, following months of unrest, the country had been on the path to a democratic transition. The process was derailed in 2021, however, when Al-Burhan and Hemedti joined forces to mount a coup against the transitional government of Abdalla Hamdok.

Although a new UN- and US-backed framework was eventually hammered out in late 2022 to facilitate a transition to civilian rule and implement security reform, many felt that a showdown between Al-Burhan and Hemedti was inevitable.

Indeed, their relationship evidently had turned into bitter animosity, culminating in violent clashes that now threaten to escalate into full-blown civil war.




Sudan's former Prime Minister Abdalla Hamdok (right), together with Generals Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan (middle) and Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo (left) during a deal-signing ceremony in Khartoum to restore the transition to civilian rule . (AFP)

In a scathing oped last week in the Wall Street Journal, the American columnist Walter Russell Mead, pointing out that Sudan has a history of 17 attempted coups, two civil wars and a genocidal conflict since independence in 1956, said: “A blind hamster has a better chance of building a nuclear submarine than the State Department had of orchestrating a democratic transition in Khartoum.”

The question for the international community now is whether it bears some moral responsibility for the diplomatic efforts that in hindsight strengthened the hands of both Al-Burhan and Hemedti, and for failing to prioritize peace building and conflict resolution when it had the chance.

The general consensus seems to be that as the Western-led economic and political order fades in the Middle East and Africa, actors such as Al-Burhan and Hemedti should be seen as who they are: powerful regional commanders interested in seizing economic opportunities and entrenching themselves, not aspiring democrats eager to share power with civil society.

Meanwhile, the World Food Programme has given warning that the violence could plunge millions more into hunger in Sudan, a country where 15 million people — one third of the population — already need aid to stave off famine.

At least 528 people had been killed and 4,599 wounded in the fighting as of April 30, according to health ministry figures, although the real toll is likely far higher. The Sudanese doctors’ union has given warning that the collapse of the health care system is “imminent.”

Appeals by UN chief Antonio Guterres to the two warring Sudanese generals to “put the interests of their people front and center, and silence the guns,” have gone unheeded so far.

 


Israeli forces seize Gaza aid boat carrying Greta Thunberg, ministry says

Updated 50 min 37 sec ago
Follow

Israeli forces seize Gaza aid boat carrying Greta Thunberg, ministry says

  • Operated by the pro-Palestinian Freedom Flotilla Coalition, the British-flagged Madleen boat is currently off the Egyptian coast, heading slowly toward the Gaza Strip, which is besieged by Israel
  • Gaza’s health ministry says over 54,000 Palestinians have been killed since the start of Israel’s military campaign

JERUSALEM: Israeli forces have taken command of a charity vessel that had tried to break a naval blockade of the Gaza Strip and the boat with its crew of 12 including activist Greta Thunberg is now heading to a port in Israel, officials said on Sunday.
The British-flagged yacht Madleen, which is operated by the pro-Palestinian Freedom Flotilla Coalition (FFC), was aiming to deliver a symbolic amount of aid to Gaza later on Monday and raise international awareness of the humanitarian crisis there.
However, the boat was boarded during the night before it could reach shore, the FFC said on its Telegram account. The Israeli Foreign Ministry later confirmed that it was under Israeli control.
“The ‘selfie yacht’ of the ‘celebrities’ is safely making its way to the shores of Israel. The passengers are expected to return to their home countries,” the ministry wrote on X.

HIGHLIGHTS

• Vessel aimed to deliver aid, raise awareness of Gaza crisis

• Crew includes climate activist Greta Thunberg

• Israel says all aboard are safe, heading to an Israeli port

• UN rapporteur urges more boats to challenge Gaza blockade

All passengers were safe and unharmed, the ministry later added. “They were provided with sandwiches and water. The show is over.”
Among the 12-strong crew are Swedish climate campaigner Thunberg and Rima Hassan, a French member of the European Parliament.
“The crew of the Freedom Flotilla was arrested by the Israeli army in international waters around 2 a.m.,” Hassan posted on X. A photograph showed the crew seated on the boat, all wearing life jackets, with their hands in the air.
The yacht is carrying a small shipment of humanitarian aid, including rice and baby formula. The Foreign Ministry said it would be taken to Gaza. “The tiny amount of aid that was on the yacht and not consumed by the ‘celebrities’ will be transferred to Gaza through real humanitarian channels,” it wrote.
Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz ordered the military on Sunday to prevent the Madleen from reaching Gaza, calling the mission a propaganda effort in support of Hamas.
Israel imposed a naval blockade on the coastal enclave after Hamas took control of Gaza in 2007.
The blockade has remained in place through multiple conflicts, including the current war, which began after a Hamas-led assault on southern Israel on October 7, 2023, that killed more than 1,200 people, according to an Israeli tally.
Gaza’s health ministry says over 54,000 Palestinians have been killed since the start of Israel’s military campaign. The United Nations has warned that most of Gaza’s more than 2 million residents are facing famine.
The Israeli government says the blockade is essential to prevent weapons from reaching Hamas.
The United Nations’ special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories, Francesca Albanese, has supported the FFC operation and on Sunday, urged other boats to challenge the Gaza blockade.
“Madleen’s journey may have ended, but the mission isn’t over. Every Mediterranean port must send boats with aid & solidarity to Gaza,” she wrote on X.

 


Israeli hostages highlighted at Boulder Jewish Festival after attack on group urging their release

Updated 09 June 2025
Follow

Israeli hostages highlighted at Boulder Jewish Festival after attack on group urging their release

  • Demonstrators handed out stickers stamped with “611,” representing the 611 days since the first Israeli hostages were taken by Hamas militants

BOULDER, Colorado: For the 611 days since Omri Miran was taken hostage by Hamas, his family has lived in fear, his brother-in-law told those gathered at the Boulder Jewish Festival on Sunday, one week after a man firebombed a group calling for the release of Israeli hostages at the mall where Moshe Lavi now spoke.
“We received only partial, limited and at times horrifying proof of life,” Lavi said to a hushed crowd. “We don’t know how much he’s suffering, deprived of food, water, sunlight, tortured, abused, as I speak to you now.”
For its 30th year, the Jewish cultural festival centered on the stories of Israeli hostages after authorities said man who yelled “Free Palestine” threw Molotov cocktails at Boulder demonstrators calling for their release. Festival organizers said they reimagined it to focus on healing and center the group’s cause — raising awareness of the 55 people believed to still be in captivity in Gaza.
Authorities said 15 people and a dog were victims of the attack at the Pearl Street pedestrian mall. They include eight women and seven men, ranging in age from 25 to 88. One is a Holocaust survivor.
Not all were physically injured, and some are considered victims for the legal case because they were present and could potentially have been hurt.
Run for Their Lives, the group targeted in the attack, started in October 2023 after Hamas militants from the Gaza Strip stormed into Israel, killing 1,200 people and taking 250 others hostage. The Boulder chapter, one of 230 worldwide, walks at the mall every weekend for 18 minutes, the numerical value of the Hebrew word “chai,” which means “life.”
Several hundred people joined the Sunday walk that typically draws only a couple dozen. Colorado Sen. John Hickenlooper was among the participants. Demonstrators handed out stickers stamped with “611,” representing the 611 days since the first Israeli hostages were taken by Hamas militants.
On a stage near the site of the attack, hundreds gathered to listen to speakers and songs. Vendors sold traditional Jewish and Israeli cuisine. In tents marked “Hostage Square,” rows of chairs sat empty save for photos of the hostages and the exhortation “Bring them home now!”
Lavi thanked local demonstrators for their bravery in advocating for his family. He described Miran as a gentle and loving gardener, husband and father to two young children.
Merav Tsubely, an Israeli-American who came to the festival from a city north of Boulder, watched as hostages’ families thanked those gathered in recorded video messages. One of Miran’s children appeared on screen and said in Hebrew, “When daddy comes back from Gaza, he’ll take me to kindergarten.”
“Just seeing them speaking to us, here, with all they’re going through, their supporting us is kind of mind blowing,” Tsubely said, her eyes welling. “It just reminds us how connected we all are.”
Mohamed Sabry Soliman, 45, was charged for the attack Thursday in Colorado state court with 118 counts, including attempted murder, assault, illegal use of explosives and animal cruelty. He was also charged with a hate crime in federal court.
Soliman, an Egyptian national who federal authorities say was living in the US illegally, told police he was driven by a desire “to kill all Zionist people,” a reference to the movement to establish and sustain a Jewish state in Israel.
The violence in downtown Boulder unfolded against the backdrop of the Israel-Hamas war, which continues to inflame global tensions and has contributed to a spike in antisemitism in the US It also came at the start of the holiday of Shavuot, which commemorates God giving the Torah to the Jewish people at Mount Sinai in Egypt.
US immigration officials took Soliman’s wife and five children, who also are Egyptian, into custody Tuesday. They have not been charged in the attack. A federal judge on Wednesday granted a request to block their deportation.
The Boulder Police Department and the FBI coordinated to provide increased security at the festival as well as local synagogues and the Boulder Jewish Community Center. Officers guarded the event’s entrances, and police Chief Stephen Redfearn said some plainclothes officers would be present in the crowd. On a rooftop near the stage, three held rifles and used binoculars to monitor the crowd as drones buzzed overhead.
Matan Gold-Edelstein’s father was present last weekend and helped douse the fire that burned an older woman. Gold-Edelstein, a 19-year-old college student, said the well-attended festival was a great show of humanity, regardless of religion or politics.
“We’re not here to be in support of a war,” he said. “We’re here in support of our religion, in support of our people and in support of the innocent people who are still being held hostage.”


Israel reveals tunnel under Gaza hospital, says body of Sinwar’s brother found there

Updated 08 June 2025
Follow

Israel reveals tunnel under Gaza hospital, says body of Sinwar’s brother found there

  • Hamas leaders Sinwar, Shabana found dead in tunnel after an Israeli strike
  • Weapons and documents also found in tunnel

KHAN YOUNIS: The Israeli army said on Sunday it had retrieved the body of Hamas’ military chief, Mohammed Sinwar, in an underground tunnel beneath a hospital in southern Gaza, following a targeted operation last month.
Another senior Hamas leader, Mohammad Shabana, commander of the Rafah Brigade, was also found dead at the scene along with a number of other militants, who are still being identified, said IDF spokesperson, Brig. Gen. Effie Defrin.
Israeli forces gave a small group of foreign reporters a tour of the tunnel that had been uncovered beneath the European Hospital in Khan Younis, which Defrin said was a major command and control compound for Hamas.
“This is another example of the cynical use by Hamas, using civilians as human shields, using civilian infrastructure, hospitals, again and again,” said Defrin.
“We found underneath the hospital, right under the emergency room, a compound of a few rooms. In one of them we found, we killed Mohammed Sinwar,” he said.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu announced Sinwar’s death last month, but Defrin said they now had his DNA which proved beyond doubt it was him.
Hamas has not commented on reports of the death of either Sinwar or Shabana.
Sinwar was the younger brother of Yahya Sinwar, the Palestinian militant group’s deceased leader and mastermind of the October 2023 attack on Israel that killed 1,200 people according to Israeli tallies, and which triggered the Israeli invasion of Gaza.
Shabana was one of Hamas’s most senior and battle-hardened commanders in southern Gaza. He played a central role in constructing the network of tunnels under the southern city of Rafah, which were used for ambushes and cross-border raids.

The drive to Khan Younis in Israeli military vehicles showed widespread devastation, with countless buildings lying in ruins, and piles of rubble collected at the roadside.
The Israeli military has raided or besieged numerous hospitals during the war, alleging that Hamas uses them to conceal fighters and orchestrate operations — a charge Hamas has repeatedly denied. While Israel has presented evidence in certain cases, some of its assertions remain unverified.
Defrin said the army had carefully planned the strike near the European Hospital in order not to damage it.
A large trench dug in front of the Emergency Room entrance led down to a hole in the claustrophobic, concrete tunnel, which was used as a hideaway by Hamas fighters, the army said.
During the search of the site, Israeli forces recovered weapon stockpiles, ammunition, cash and documents that are now being reviewed for intelligence value.
“We will dismantle Hamas because we cannot live with this terror organization right in our backyard, right across our border,” Defrin said.
More than 54,000 Palestinians have died during the ongoing Israeli assault, according to Gaza health authorities. The UN has warned that most of Gaza’s 2.3 million population is at risk of famine.


Iranian authorities expand ban on dog walking

Iranians walk their dogs in a park in Tehran on June 8, 2025. (AFP)
Updated 08 June 2025
Follow

Iranian authorities expand ban on dog walking

  • Local authorities have periodically introduced bans on walking dogs in public spaces or carrying them in vehicles as part of a wider campaign to discourage their ownership

TEHRAN: Iranian authorities have expanded a ban on walking dogs in public to multiple cities nationwide, citing public health, social order and safety concerns, domestic media reported on Sunday.
The ban —which echoes a 2019 police directive that barred walking dogs in Tehran — was expanded to Ilam city in the west on Sunday, according to reports.
At least 17 other cities recently introduced similar bans, including Isfahan in the center and Kerman in the south.
Owning and walking dogs has been a contentious topic since the 1979 revolution in Iran, though there is no law outrightly banning dog ownership.
Many religious scholars, however, consider petting dogs or coming into contact with their saliva as "najis" or ritually impure, while some officials view them as a symbol of Western cultural influence.
Local authorities have periodically introduced bans on walking dogs in public spaces or carrying them in vehicles as part of a wider campaign to discourage their ownership.
Enforcing the restrictions has been largely inconsistent, as many owners continue to walk their dogs in Tehran and elsewhere across Iran.
On Sunday, the Etemad newspaper quoted an official from Ilam city as saying that "legal action will be taken against violators."
On Saturday, a state newspaper said the latest measures are aimed at "maintaining public order, ensuring safety and protecting public health."
"Dog walking is a threat to public health, peace and comfort," said Abbas Najafi, prosecutor of the western city of Hamedan, as quoted by Iran newspaper.
In 2021, some 75 lawmakers condemned pet ownership as a "destructive social problem," saying it could "gradually change the Iranian and Islamic way of life."
In 2017, Iran's supreme leader, Ali Khamenei, said that "keeping dogs for reasons other than herding, hunting, and guard dogs is considered reprehensible."
"If this practice resembles that of non-Muslims, promotes their culture, or causes harm and disturbance to neighbours, it is deemed forbidden," he added.

 


Israeli bulldozers flatten more Palestinian buildings in Tulkarm refugee camp

Updated 08 June 2025
Follow

Israeli bulldozers flatten more Palestinian buildings in Tulkarm refugee camp

  • Entire residential area reduced to rubble in recent days, residents say
  • Israeli forces plan to destroy 58 structures in Tulkarm, 48 in Nur Shams

LONDON: Israeli forces have conducted demolitions for the third consecutive day in the Palestinian refugee camp of Tulkarm in the northern part of the West Bank, the site of military operations since January.

On Sunday, Israeli bulldozers resumed demolition of numerous residential buildings in the camp. The demolitions are part of the destruction plan of 58 structures in Tulkarm and 48 in the Nur Shams refugee camp.

More than 250 housing units and dozens of commercial establishments have been destroyed in both locations, according to Wafa news agency.

Residents say that an entire residential area in the Tulkarm camp has been reduced to rubble in recent days, with debris hindering access to surrounding buildings.

Israeli operations in Tulkarm for the past 133 days and in Nur Shams for the past 120 days have resulted in the deaths of 13 Palestinians and the displacement of almost 25,000 residents.

At least 400 homes have been destroyed and 2,573 damaged after Israeli forces sealed off roads and entrances with earth barriers and barred Palestinian residents from returning, the Wafa added.