El-Geneina’s struggle: Life amid Sudan war and humanitarian challenges

El-Geneina, Sudan – The lecture halls of the Faculty of Medicine at the University of el-Geneina have been turned into shelters for people displaced from elsewhere in Sudan.

Zainab, who did not wish to give her full name, is sitting among them, holding two of her surviving three children.

She once had six. But three of them were killed after what she says was a June 26, 2024, Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) attack on her home in Omdurman, part of the wider region of Khartoum – the capital of Sudan.

“We were targeted even though there were no Rapid Support Forces or checkpoints nearby,” Zainab said in a low voice. “I lost three of my children.”

Zainab was once a nurse in Omdurman, while her husband was a police officer. He disappeared in the chaos of the battle in the city that they fled from.

After abandoning Omdurman, she initially sought shelter in the college halls where Al Jazeera met her, before moving on to a small hut she built herself on the campus grounds.

She describes her home in simple terms – a cooking area with two pots, a small bedroom with a mattress on the ground where two of her daughters sleep and a bed for another daughter and her niece, while she sleeps outside the hut.

“We are relying on God. I have three daughters with me here; they need food, clothes, and drink, and all of this is not available,” Zainab said. “All the families here in the camp suffer from the same problems. Until now, there is no official organisation we rely on. Sometimes, kind people come and give us things, but it’s not enough.”