Satellite images of Draraja Oula in El-Fasher, Sudan (October 27, 2025), showing scattered objects measuring 1.5-2 meters (human size) in heaps surrounded by reddish discolorations (likely blood). These heaps are surrounded by technicals (pickups mounted with machine guns), commonly used by the RSF.
Trump’s Threats
Al-Fasher, Possible Massacre as Observed from Space
An analysis of satellite imagery conducted by Yale’s Public Health Humanitarian Research Lab (HRL) between October 27 and 28, when RSF forces entered El-Fasher in Eastern Darfur, revealed that the group likely engaged in mass killing of hundreds or thousands of civilians. Selected images, for instance, from the Al-Saudi hospital revealed figures resembling humans in a long queue, while a later image showed three heaps in the same compound, with white figures appearing like corpses in white bags, which were surrounded by red blotches appearing like blood. Those escaping from the city reported that men were separated from women, and captured women were told that the men would rejoin them later. However, gunshots were heard before the heaps mentioned earlier appeared the following day. Similar heaps surrounded by red discoloration, located close to technicals, appeared across the city, suggesting that people were shot and bled out to their deaths across El-Fasher. HRL noted that in addition to the strong evidence of mass killing, RSF engaged in other provable violations, including invading and occupying Al-Saudi Hospital, storming a Red Crescent office, and kidnapping its staff.
Comparison Between Violence in Nigeria and Sudan
Despite limitations in obtaining accurate data, the European Union Agency for Asylum (EUAA) reported that the war in Sudan’s Khartoum alone directly caused 26,024 deaths between April 15, 2023 and June 4, 2024 (roughly a year), and 61, 202 indirect deaths caused by war conditions such as elevated accident rates, diseases, and starvation. Worth noting is that the main front line between the RSF and the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) is far away from Khartoum in the east, including in El-Fasher, where more deaths occurred. The EUAA’s report added that over 90% of instances could have gone unreported, suggesting that potentially hundreds of thousands die across the country every year. In sharp contrast, the conflict in Nigeria killed about 13,978 people annually between 2019 and 2024, according to the Association for Catholic Information in Africa. Therefore, many times more people have been dying in the Sudan’s conflict than in Nigeria’s, even while the former has been escalating, especially considering the recent events in Al-Fasher. Nigeria, which has a functional government, seems to be controlling the conflict, as the average mortality for the three years ending in May 2025 reduced to about 3,300, according to Amnesty International. However, some sources report significantly higher deaths in Q2 of 2025, but these numbers are still significantly lower than the case in Sudan.
Unlike in Nigeria, where violence is directed towards both Christians and Muslims, the Sudan’s case shows that it is primarily directed at Christians. For instance, the Tahrir Institute for Middle Eastern Studies reported in 2024 that both the RSF and SAF consistently attacked Christian communities from the beginning of the conflict, views that were confirmed in November 2025 by the US-based International Christian Concerns (ICC). Also, while Amnesty International reported that both sides committed war crimes against non-Arab minorities, it is important to note that these minorities are primarily Christians. It can be concluded that, no matter the bitter differences that RSF and SAF have, both agree in directing brutality towards Christians and minorities. Both sides were created to support the regime of the former dictator, Omar al-Bashir, including through war crimes, and committing war crimes is their modus operandi. Unlike in Nigeria, where the government is trying to resolve the crises, parties to Sudan’s conflict can only accelerate violence to subdue each other and eliminate minorities, making the situation precarious, but apparently not for Trump.
What is Trump’s/Washington’s Motivation
Trump’s threat against Nigeria is meant to hide Washington’s political and diplomatic bankruptcy. Some have pointed out how the US is displeased that Nigeria sought deeper economic and security relations with China and Russia. As a result, the US, being unable to offer Nigeria sound proposals for economic and defense cooperation, aims to threaten the African country to either return under domination or face destruction in a war between the US and US-backed Islamists operating within Nigerian territory. Washington is desperate after realizing that countries have moved on from the paralysis it perpetuated through creating terror threats and launching endless wars, purportedly against terrorists it was funding. Meanwhile, Washington required all countries to halt development and invest in its curated wars with no end in sight. To illustrate the centrality of terrorism in Washington’s imperialist calculus, US Senator Scot Perry in February 2025 revealed that his country had been funding terrorists (and their training camps), including Al-Qaeda (and a known associate of Osama Bin Laden), the Taliban, and Nigeria-based Boko Haram. Therefore, Trump’s threat against Nigeria reveals an attempt to intensify the chaos that Washington has been driving through funding terrorist groups. If the US were to deploy its Military to Nigeria under the guise of fighting terrorists that are killing Christians, it would only bomb civilian infrastructure, including roads, bridges, power stations, and schools, while stealing oil and minerals, like it did in Afghanistan and Iraq.
Trump (like his country) lacks political, diplomatic, and economic capital to engage with other countries and can only use threats of creating chaos and stealing oil. Washington is incapable of proposing or joining Nigerians in joint development of social, economic, or security infrastructure, but thinks threats can force Africans to bow to neocolonialism. It has tried similar threats on Venezuela, Iran, China, and Russia, requiring them to agree to Western-directed plunder or face political and military attacks. Like other colonial powers, Washington has been blinded by greed to underestimate other peoples’ fortitude and love for dignity, attributes that made underequipped and even poorly organized groups in the Global South defeat Western colonialists, including the UK, France, Portugal, and Italy, among others. Trump’s plot, like US neocolonialism propagated through chaos and endless wars, will fail and bankrupt the country even further.
Simon Chege Ndiritu is a political observer and research analyst from Africa
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