A strategic target
Wad al-Nour village lies about 160 kilometers south of Sudanese capital Khartoum and is now the latest epicenter of violence in a country ravaged by internal conflict.
The village has long been a strategic target for the RSF, given its close location to Al-Manaqil, where the Sudanese army maintains its only presence in Al-Jazira state.
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This was not the first attempt by the RSF to control Wad al-Noura, as they have tried several times to take the village.
Thousands have perished since fighting erupted between forces loyal to two rival generals – army chief Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, leader of the SAF, and General
Mohamed Hamdan Dagalo, head of the RSF.
Since the conflict started, both the Sudanese army and the RSF have faced damning accusations of civilian massacres.
The RSF has specifically targeted villages in Al-Jazira, Sudan’s agricultural heartland, to swell its ranks through forced conscription and using hunger as a weapon, eyewitnesses have said.