This piece aired in the April 24, 2023 episode of Crosscurrents.
On Saturday, members of the Sudanese community held a rally in front of San Francisco's City Hall to protest the violence that erupted in Sudan last week. The army and a paramilitary force called the RSF - clashed. According to the UN, more than 400 people are dead and thirty five hundred injured.
It’s a fight over control of the country, and it’s being fought inside the residential neighborhoods, including in the capital city Khartoum.
The army is bombing from above, the armed militia is roaming the streets shooting, terrorizing families. Militiamen have taken over people’s homes, and people are being forced to flee their homes and cities in search of safety, food and water.
The US has evacuated embassy staff there, but an estimated 16 thousand American citizens remain stranded, left to fend for themselves. Many are trying to make treacherous trips to Egypt or the country's port, Port Sudan- 500 miles away from the capital - to catch ships to the Saudi port city of Jeddah.
Hundreds of Sudanese live in the Bay Area, like KALW's Hana Baba. Many have family back home, in the ravaged capital city. Hana and her fellow community members have constantly been on their phones trying to stay in touch with family and friends — there’s a feeling of shock and outrage. Everyone is trying to help through social media, to coordinate safe escape routes, medical help, fundraise.
At the rally, there were families, elders, children, people waved flags, teenagers and college aged kids — who were born and raised in the US chanted 'stop the war in Sudan'.
For a sense of the impact the violence is having on local Sudanese, Hana talked to rally attendees Nibras Suliman- a junior at UC Berkeley, and Elharith Elrufaie- who leads the Sudanese Association of Northern California.
If you’d like to help relief efforts please go click here for the Sudanese American Physicians Association.
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