‘Africa Doesn’t Get Any Love’: In Philadelphia, Sudanese Communities Respond To Ongoing Military Conflict
By Razan Idris
For the end of Ramadan, Methany Eltigani traveled from her workplace in Wisconsin to spend time with her family in Northeast Philadelphia. But on April 15, what would usually be joyous holy days for Eltigani’s Sudanese family took a sour turn. When Eltigani woke from her nap following suhoor, her mother, worriedly frowning at her phone, said, "There's violence in Sudan right now, you should check the news." Dread rose in Eltigani’s throat as she picked up her own phone to see that the long-time power struggle between the Sudanese army and the Rapid Support Forces had suddenly exploded in Sudan’s major cities.
In the 2000s, Sudan’s former president, Omar Al-Bashir, employed the Janjaweed forces to carry out a genocide in Darfur. Later, these forces became the R.S.F. After a popular uprising in 2019 overthrew al-Bashir, the Sudanese military and R.S.F.'s struggle for power steadily escalated. With the two groups openly battling, civilians in residential neighborhoods are exposed to heavy artillery fire, air strikes, looting, and home attacks. In Philadelphia, the city’s 3,000 strong Sudanese community are scrambling to contact friends and family seeking refuge from violence. But getting into contact with loved ones isn’t easy.
“I had just visited Nyala in March for my brother's wedding, but now my sister-in-law is stuck there,” Eltigani tells Al-Bustan. “We’re just relying on patchy Internet to daily check on the safety of our family over WhatsApp.” Decentralized civilian networks formed during 2019’s uprising are all that many rely on for news. However, displacement has made keeping track of family difficult, too. Since mid-April, over 700,000 Sudanese have fled their homes, according to estimates from the International Organization for Migration.
“Africa doesn’t get any love on the news…”
When the fighting broke out in Khartoum, Eltigani’s friend and fellow University of Pennsylvania alum Iman Omer was there for her aunt’s funeral. She was still in Khartoum when the R.S.F. attacked the city’s international airport. To flee, Iman and her mourning family members embarked on three expensive days of bus travel from Khartoum to the Egyptian border where they struggled to cross in the crowded summer heat with no humanitarian assistance. “I’ve just been crying since I got back,” admitted Omer. “It was such a traumatic trip and very hard to talk about.”
Philly’s Sudanese community is no stranger to activism for issues surrounding Sudan, but as Eltigani’s older sister, Muhga, bluntly tells Al-Bustan, “Africa doesn’t get any love on the news, and not even Sudanese American citizens were evacuated from Sudan.” What coverage there is of the current crisis is largely due to the work of Sudanese journalists and diasporic community members setting up resources such as Eyes on Sudan.
UNITED STATES - SEPTEMBER 17: Muhga Eltigani (left), 15, and Emtithal Mahmoud, 12, from Darfur, Sudan, hold a banner during a demonstration at the Unitarian Church of All Souls on Lexington Ave. against genocide in their home country. (Photo by Debbie Egan-Chin/NY Daily News Archive via Getty Images)
“It was the same in the 2000s with the Darfur Genocide,” recalls Muhga. “It took months for American news outlets to notice, while every other week I was at a protest or a fundraising effort or giving mini speeches.”
Normally, Sudanese communities could connect during emergencies over WhatsApp and individually send money directly to families abroad. However, the closing of banks during the escalating violence means cash has become inaccessible. Instead, Philadelphia community members are turning to social media to donate to the Sudanese-American Physicians Association and to the Sudanese Doctors Trade Union, who are providing free telemedicine as hospital infrastructure collapses.
Over the past few weeks, more than 487 civilians have been killed and another 5,100 injured during the fighting in Sudan. So far, the Eltiganis’ extended family has remained physically unharmed. But after a month of conflict, a cloud of fear hangs over Philadelphia’s Sudanese diaspora regarding what will happen to their families if the military infighting continues. In Sudan, civilians have increasingly few means of income, healthcare, or food.
“All I can do is pray, turn off my social media, and disassociate while I’m at work each day,” Altigani says. “Otherwise, I end up just sobbing with worry.”
Razan Idris is a Sudanese-American PhD candidate in History at the University of Pennsylvania and the curator of the #SudanSyllabus, working on a project tentatively titled The Colors of the Earth: Blackness in 1930s Egypt