As el-Fasher is starved, Sudanese journalists struggle to report a war buried by blackouts and global neglect.
El-Fasher, Sudan: a city besieged, starving and largely unseen. As journalists come under fire in Sudan, a lack of international media interest is helping to conceal one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
Contributors: Hassan Berkia – Journalist Kholood Khair – Director, Confluence Advisory Khalid Medani – Associate Professor, McGill Institute of Islamic Studies
On our radar:
In the occupied West Bank, American journalist Jasper Nathaniel filmed Israeli settlers – backed by soldiers – attacking Palestinians during the olive harvest. Ryan Kohls speaks to Nathaniel about what he witnessed and what it reveals about Israel’s culture of impunity.
India’s news channels were once symbols of a vibrant democracy. Today, they’re seen by many of India’s neighbours as propaganda tools – exporting jingoism, sensationalism and Hindutva politics across borders. Meenakshi Ravi reports on rising anti-India sentiment in the region and a crisis of credibility that no longer stops at home.
Featuring:
Roman Gautam – Editor, Himal Southasian Deepak Kumar Goswami – Filmmaker & actor Smita Sharma – Journalist
As el-Fasher is starved, Sudanese journalists struggle to report a war buried by blackouts and global neglect.
El-Fasher, Sudan: a city besieged, starving and largely unseen. As journalists come under fire in Sudan, a lack of international media interest is helping to conceal one of the world’s worst humanitarian crises.
Contributors: Hassan Berkia – Journalist Kholood Khair – Director, Confluence Advisory Khalid Medani – Associate Professor, McGill Institute of Islamic Studies
On our radar:
In the occupied West Bank, American journalist Jasper Nathaniel filmed Israeli settlers – backed by soldiers – attacking Palestinians during the olive harvest. Ryan Kohls speaks to Nathaniel about what he witnessed and what it reveals about Israel’s culture of impunity.
India’s news channels were once symbols of a vibrant democracy. Today, they’re seen by many of India’s neighbours as propaganda tools – exporting jingoism, sensationalism and Hindutva politics across borders. Meenakshi Ravi reports on rising anti-India sentiment in the region and a crisis of credibility that no longer stops at home.
Featuring:
Roman Gautam – Editor, Himal Southasian Deepak Kumar Goswami – Filmmaker & actor Smita Sharma – Journalist
CHICAGO — Since the Trump administration announced its intention to accelerate and forcefully detain and deport thousands of immigrants here, the Chicago area is a split screen between everyday life and a city under siege.
As many people shop, go to work, walk their dogs and stroll with their friends through parks, others are being chased down, tear-gassed, detained and assaulted by federal agents carrying out immigration sweeps.
The situation is similar to what occurred in Los Angeles in summer, as ICE swept through Southern California, grabbing people off the street and raiding car washes and Home Depots in predominantly Latino areas, while leaving large swaths of the region untouched.
Take Sunday, the day of the Chicago Marathon.
Some 50,000 runners hailing from more than 100 countries and 50 states, gathered downtown to dash, jog and slog over 26.3 miles of Lake Michigan shoreline and city streets.
The sun was bright, the temperatures hovered in the upper-60s, and leaves of maple, oak, aspen and ginkgo trees colored the city with splashes of yellow, orange and red.
Demonstrators march outside the Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Broadview, Ill., on Oct. 10.
(Kayana Szymczak/For The Times)
It was one of those rare, glorious Midwestern fall days when everyone comes outside to soak in the sunlight, knowing the gloom and cold of winter is about to take hold.
At 12:30, Ludwig Marchel and Karen Vanherck of Belgium strolled west along East Monroe Street, through Millennium Park. They smiled and proudly wore medals around their necks commemorating their marathon achievement. They said they were not concerned about coming to Chicago, despite news stories depicting violent protests and raids, and the Trump administration’s description of the city as “war torn,” a “hellhole,” a “killing field” and “the most dangerous city in the world.”
“Honestly. I was mostly worried that the government shutdown was somehow going to affect my flight,” said Marchel. He said he hadn’t seen anything during his few days in town that would suggest the city was unsafe.
Another man, who declined to give his name, said he had come from Mexico City to complete the race. He said he wasn’t concerned, either.
“I have my passport, I have a visa, and I have money,” he said. “Why should I be concerned?”
Dozens of residents in the quiet, leafy neighborhood of Albany Park had gathered in the street to shout “traitor” and “Nazi” as federal immigration agents grabbed a man and attempted to detain others.
According to witness accounts, agents in at least three vehicles got out and started shoving people to the ground before throwing tear gas canisters into the street. Videos of the event show masked agents tackling a person in a red shirt, throwing a person in a skeleton costume to the ground, and violently hurling a bicycle out of the street as several plumes of smoke billow into the air. A woman can be heard screaming while neighbors yell at the agents.
Last week, a federal judge issued a temporary restraining order requiring agents to issue two warnings before using riot control weapons such as tear gas, chemical sprays, plastic bullets and flash grenades.
Deirdre Anglin, community member from Chicago, takes part in a demonstration near an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Broadview, Ill., on Oct. 10.
(Kayana Szymczak/For The Times)
Since Trump’s “Operation Midway Blitz” was initiated more than six weeks ago, roughly 1,000 people have been arrested or detained.
At the ICE detention facility, in Broadview — a suburb 12 miles west of downtown — there have been daily protests. While most have been peaceful, some have devolved into physical clashes between federal agents or police and protesters.
In September, federal agents shot pepper balls and tear gas at protesters peacefully gathering outside the facility. On Saturday, local law enforcement forced protesters away from the site with riot sticks and threats of tear gas. Several protesters were knocked to the ground and forcefully handcuffed. By the end of the evening, 15 people had been arrested.
Early Sunday afternoon, roughly two dozen protesters returned to the site. They played music, danced, socialized and heckled ICE vehicles as they entered and exited the fenced-off facility.
In a largely Latino Chicago neighborhood called Little Village, things appeared peaceful Sunday afternoon.
Known affectionately by its residents as the “Midwestern capital of Mexico,” the district of 85,000 is predominantly Latino. Michael Rodriguez, a Chicago city councilman and the neighborhood’s alderman, said 85% of the population is of Mexican descent.
On Sunday afternoon, traditional Mexican music was being broadcast to the street via loudspeakers from the OK Corral VIP, a western wear store.
Demonstrators protest near an Immigration and Customs Enforcement detention facility in Broadview, Ill., on Oct. 10.
(Kayana Szymczak/For The Times)
Along East 26th Street, where shops and buildings are painted with brightly colored murals depicting Mexican folklore, history and wildlife — such as a golden eagle and jaguar — a family sat at a table eating lunch, while two young women, in their early 20s, laughed and chattered as they strolled west toward Kedzie Avenue.
Rodriguez said that despite appearances, “people are afraid.”
He said he spoke with a teacher who complained that several of her elementary-school aged students have stopped coming to class. Their parents are too afraid to walk them or drive them to school, hearing stories of other parents who have been arrested or detained by ICE agents at other campuses in the city — in front of their terrified children.
Rodriguez’s wife, whom he described as a dark-skinned Latina with degrees from DePaul and Northwestern universities, won’t leave the house without her passport.
At a barber shop called Peluqueria 5 Star Fades Estrellas on 26th, a coiffeur named Juan Garcia sat in a chair near the store entrance. He had a towel draped over the back of his neck. He said his English was limited, but he knew enough to tell a visitor that business was bad.
“People aren’t coming in,” he said. “They are afraid.”
Victor Sanchez, the owner of a taco truck parked on Kedzie Road, about a half-mile south of town, said his clientele — mostly construction workers and landscapers — have largely disappeared.
“Business is down 60%,” he said to a customer. “I don’t know if they have been taken, or if they are too afraid to come out. All I know is they aren’t coming here anymore.”
Rodriguez said that ICE agents have arrested people who live in his neighborhood, but those arrests took place outside the borders of his district.
“I think they know this is a well-organized and aware neighborhood,” he said. “I think they’ve cased it and decided to grab people on the outskirts.”
Meet Farah and Myriam — two young girls from Gaza.
For Farah, night means fear — a reminder of loved ones killed in the darkness.
For Myriam, her home was destroyed, taking her mother and sister. Her aunt’s body remains buried under the rubble. She lives in a tent beside the ruins and this is where the two girls meet to share their grief, fears and hopes for the future after two years of war.
Farah and Myriam is directed by Wissam Moussa. It’s part of From Ground Zero, a collection of 22 short films made in Gaza, initiated by Palestinian director Rashid Masharawi, to tell the untold stories of the current war.
From Ground Zero was the official submission of Palestine, in the Best International Feature Film category of the 97th Academy Awards in 2025.
Displacement has surged in el-Fasher as paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) intensified attacks on North Darfur’s capital, according to a United Nations report.
More than one million people have fled el-Fasher since the start of Sudan’s civil war, with the exodus dramatically accelerating as the RSF has increased attacks following its loss of control of the Sudanese capital, Khartoum, earlier this year, according to data published by the International Organization for Migration (IOM) on Sunday.
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The number of internally displaced people (IDP) sheltering in el-Fasher plummeted 70 percent, from approximately 699,000 to 204,000, between March and September, the IOM’s Displacement Tracking Matrix says.
El-Fasher’s overall population has now shrunk by 62 percent from its pre-war level of 1.11 million to just 413,454 people.
Sharp decline
The sharp decline follows the recapture of Khartoum by the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) in late March, after which the RSF pivoted to consolidating control over Darfur. El-Fasher represents the army’s last major urban stronghold.
April has been one of the most violent months this year, with nearly 500,000 people – representing almost all of the camp’s population – displaced from Zamzam IDP camp in a single incident.
The Sudanese army has been battling the RSF for control of the country since April 2023, triggering what has widely been described as the world’s largest humanitarian crisis.
Millions have fled to neighbouring countries, with Egypt and Chad absorbing the majority.
Cross-border movement into Chad surged by 45 percent year-on-year in 2025, reaching nearly 1.2 million people.
Those who are unable to leave the country have been internally displaced to surrounding areas. The IDP population in the nearby Tawila locality more than doubled from 238,000 to 576,000 between March and September.
The RSF has maintained a siege of el-Fasher since May 2024, cutting off supply routes and trapping an estimated 260,000 civilians, including 130,000 children, without sustained humanitarian access for more than 16 months.
The Yale Humanitarian Lab, which has been monitoring the war, published satellite imagery which it said showed earthen berms built by the RSF almost encircling the city, helping to enforce the siege and preventing the movement of supplies and people.
Recent weeks have seen escalating violence. A September drone attack on a mosque during Friday prayers killed more than 70 worshippers, prompting the UN to raise the alarm about the possibility of “ethnically motivated” killings if the city falls to the RSF.
The RSF has been widely reported to have targeted non-Arab populations across Darfur, with their fighters frequently filming themselves shouting racial slurs at their victims.
In early September, UN investigators accused both sides of committing atrocities. They said the RSF is committing “murder, torture, enslavement, rape, sexual slavery, sexual violence, forced displacement and persecution on ethnic, gender and political grounds”.
Meanwhile, the humanitarian situation continues to worsen.
Among households surveyed in August, 87 percent reported needing healthcare, but 78 percent were unable to access treatment due to destroyed facilities, insecurity, and lack of medicine.
Food security has deteriorated sharply, with 89 percent of households facing poor or borderline food consumption.
Since the siege began, more than 1,100 grave violations against children have been verified in el-Fasher, including over 1,000 children killed or maimed, according to UNICEF.
The battle for el-Fasher has become central to the broader war’s trajectory.
Key city
The RSF controls most of western Sudan, including nearly all of Darfur, while government forces hold the north and the east.
In July, the RSF and its allies announced a widely condemned “parallel government” in the country, underlining the deep political divide which has become more entrenched in the country.
El-Fasher’s potential fall would give the paramilitary force control over virtually the entire Darfur region.
Activists from 40 countries sail from Tunisia to defy Israel’s blockade and deliver aid to Gaza.
Published On 13 Sep 202513 Sep 2025
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An international convoy of boats, the Global Sumud Flotilla (GSF), has set sail from Tunisia, aiming to defy Israel’s siege on Gaza and deliver humanitarian aid.
The GSF, which departed Bizerte Port on Saturday, includes more than 40 vessels carrying between 500 and 700 activists from more than 40 countries, according to Anadolu.
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Participants say they are determined to break Israel’s blockade of Gaza.
Among those joining is Franco-Palestinian lawmaker Rima Hassan, a member of the French National Assembly, who announced her participation after boarding in Tunisia.
“Our governments are responsible for the continuation of the genocide in Gaza,” Hassan wrote on X, accusing European leaders of silence in the face of Israeli attacks on aid convoys. In June, she joined another Gaza-bound boat that Israeli forces seized in international waters.
he flotilla is supported by prominent activists, including Swedish climate campaigner Greta Thunberg, who has long been vilified by Israeli officials for her solidarity with Palestinians.
The flotilla reported this week that two of its ships – the Family, which had members of the steering committee on board, and the Alma – were attacked while anchored near Tunis.
Activists suspect Israeli involvement, noting that one of the vessels was struck by a drone.
Tunisia’s Ministry of the Interior confirmed a “premeditated aggression” and said an investigation had been launched.
Despite the attacks, flotilla organisers insist they will press ahead. “Faced with this inaction, I am joining this citizens’ initiative, which is the largest humanitarian maritime convoy ever undertaken,” Hassan said.
History of intervention
This is not the first time Israel has moved to stop such missions.
In early June, Israeli naval forces intercepted the Madleen ship in international waters, seizing its aid supplies and detaining the crew of 12 activists. Another vessel, the Conscience, was struck by drones in May near Maltese waters, leaving it unable to continue its journey.
Organisers say the GSF – named after the Arabic word for resilience – represents one of the boldest challenges yet to Israel’s control of Gaza’s coastline.
The attempt comes as the United Nations warns of famine in Gaza, with more than half a million people facing catastrophic hunger.
Israeli forces have rounded up and arrested Palestinians en masse in the occupied West Bank’s Tulkarem. The operation is being described as “collective punishment” after several Israeli soldiers were injured in an attack.
Palestinians face mass arrests, displacement in the occupied territory as Netanyahu pushes settlement expansion.
Israeli forces have sealed off entrances to Tulkarem in the northern occupied West Bank, further escalating a campaign of raids, arrests and collective punishment that has displaced thousands of Palestinians as the military relentlessly destroys Gaza.
Footage from Thursday night shared by residents showed soldiers marching Palestinians in lines through the streets in what many described as a humiliating show of force.
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Tulkarem Governor Abdullah Kamil appealed to the international community on Friday, urging the United Nations General Assembly, the Human Rights Council, and humanitarian groups to act against what he called “crimes” being committed against the city’s nearly 100,000 residents.
Kamil said Israeli forces were “arbitrarily and unjustly” carrying out mass arrests, storming homes, destroying property and “terrorising children and women”, according to the Palestinian news agency Wafa.
On Thursday, Israeli forces in Tulkarem were allegedly struck by what Israel called an explosive device that injured two Israeli soldiers.
Al Jazeera’s Nida Ibrahim, reporting from Doha, described “videos of the Israeli forces dragging hundreds and hundreds of Palestinians from their homes, from their cafes, from even a garage … in a show of humiliation”.
“They’re trying to remind everyone that if there is any incident in any place in the occupied West Bank that they do not like … they’re going to crack down, not just on the perpetrators … but on everyone in that vicinity,” said Ibrahim.
She added that Israel’s crackdown has displaced “tens of thousands of Palestinians out of their homes … rendering the city, the refugee camps into ghost towns”. Ibrahim said Palestinians see this as part of a broader policy, with Israeli forces trying “to crack down on Palestinians and really … remind them who has the upper hand and control in the occupied West Bank”.
Elsewhere in the West Bank, five young Palestinians were shot and wounded by Israeli forces in the village of Deir Jarir, Wafa reported. One of the injured was arrested before receiving medical treatment, according to the village council. Israeli soldiers also closed the village entrance for several hours.
Israeli troops stormed Nablus and the nearby town of Beit Furik at dawn on Friday, raiding several neighbourhoods in the Old City and surrounding areas.
Witnesses said shops were ransacked, while in Beitin, east of Ramallah, Israeli soldiers seized a house and converted it into a military barracks.
The Palestinian Ministry of Foreign Affairs condemned the raids, saying international silence had emboldened Israel to press ahead with unilateral measures aimed at destabilising the territory.
‘There will be no Palestinian state’
The escalation comes as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu advances an illegal settlement expansion plan that would all but eliminate the possibility of a Palestinian state.
On Thursday, he signed an agreement to push forward with construction in the so-called E1 area near the illegal Israeli settlement of Maale Adumim, several kilometres to the east of Jerusalem.
“We are going to fulfil our promise that there will be no Palestinian state. This place belongs to us,” Netanyahu declared at the signing ceremony, adding: “We are going to double the city’s population.”
The project, which has been driven by far-right ministers in the government, Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben-Gvir, covers a 12sq km (4.6sq mile) stretch of land and foresees 3,400 new homes for Israeli settlers. Critics say the plan would cut off large parts of the occupied West Bank from East Jerusalem while linking together major settlement blocs.
Palestinians view East Jerusalem as the capital of their future state. Under international law, all Israeli settlements in occupied territory are illegal, regardless of whether they have Israeli government approval.
SACRAMENTO — Gov. Gavin Newsom used his written State of the State address Tuesday to cast California as a bulwark against a menacing Trump administration he accused of dismantling public services, flouting the rule of law and using extortion to bully businesses and universities.
The remarks came as Newsom’s national profile has grown and given him a broader political stage, even as he skipped the literal one — opting to send his speech to lawmakers in writing rather than deliver it from the Assembly rostrum, which is customary. His address painted a portrait of a state under siege by the federal government even as it grapples with the aftermath of the devastating Los Angeles County fires, spiraling housing costs and an uneven economic recovery.
While he framed Trump and his allies as the chief obstacle to progress, he leaned on familiar themes of California’s resilience, pointing to disaster response, investments in schools and clean energy and the state’s economic staying power. He said as California celebrates the 175th anniversary of statehood, “the state of the state is strong, fully committed to defending democracy, and resolved to never bend.”
“It would be a mistake to think California is cowering in the face of this onslaught,” Newsom said in the 2,300-word address accompanied by a shortened video version.
The written address marks the fifth year in a row that Newsom has diverged from the decades-old tradition of the governor delivering the annual address in person to lawmakers at the state Capitol.
His unconventional approach has drawn some criticism, particularly by Republicans who characterized it as an example of Newsom lacking respect for the institution. California’s Constitution only requires that the State of the State be submitted as a written letter to the Legislature, which was how governors up until roughly the 1960s fulfilled their duty. Starting with the late Gov. Pat Brown, the addresses were delivered in person, typically in January as a way to set the agenda for the year.
Newsom, who dislikes reading from a teleprompter due to his dyslexia, has not delivered his State of the State in the Capitol since 2020, shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2021, Newsom’s address was streamed from an empty Dodgers Stadium and, two years later, he declined to give a speech in lieu of a statewide press tour, during which he unveiled new policies.
“His ambitions are more than his ability to govern this state,” Assembly Republican leader James Gallagher of Yuba City said in a video posted on X. “And here is another symbol of that, not showing up to talk about what is actually going on in the state and how we can actually come together to get things done.”
This year’s speech arrives unusually late in the year, as lawmakers race to approve hundreds of bills ahead of Friday’s legislative deadline. It also comes at a moment when Newsom, in the final stretch of his governorship, is drawing national attention not only for his confrontations with Trump but also for a shrewd social media assault that borrows the president’s own trolling style to energize supporters and burnish his public brand.
But Newsom’s record has also drawn sharp criticism.
After nearly two terms, California continues to wrestle with entrenched homelessness, soaring housing costs and one of the nation’s highest costs of living. A budget deficit has swelled in part because the governor expanded Medi-Cal healthcare coverage to include all income-eligible undocumented immigrants. And his move to undercut Texas lawmakers who redrew legislative maps to add additional Republican seats in Congress by asking California voters to do the same to add Democrats has fueled charges that he is accelerating a national wave of partisan gerrymandering and energizing state Republicans.
“My last letter to you warned about the poisonous populism of the right and the anxiety many people were feeling about the state of this country — some of it grounded in real fear about the national economy, but much of it stoked by misinformation and bigotry,” Newsom wrote to lawmakers. “We are now nine months into a battle to protect the values we hold most dear and to preserve the economic and social foundation we built for California. We are facing a federal administration built on incompetence and malicious ignorance, one that seeks the death of independent thinking.”
Newsom said California showed the country its resilient spirit in January during the deadly wind-driven wildfires that destroyed thousands of homes and forced mass evacuations in Los Angeles County. Newsom credited emergency responders who put their lives at risk saving trapped residents.
“Through executive orders waiving red tape, the state paved the way for debris-removal crews to move quickly through damaged areas and streamlined permits to speed rebuilding,” Newsom wrote. “Homes are now rising.”
While California looked to the Trump administration for help, Newsom said the state has found none.
“Even as fires still burned, the newly elected President began targeting our state — testing our resolve with his relentless, unhinged California obsession,” Newsom wrote.
From fires to immigration, Newsom said Trump’s approach has been the same: Abandon California when it is in crisis and attack its liberal values. The U.S. Supreme Court cleared the way Monday for federal authorities to return to mass immigration arrests at workplaces, bus stops and other places in Los Angeles. Newsom said Trump’s decision in June to deploy the National Guard and U.S. Marines to Los Angeles to help with immigration enforcement was a “cowardly attempt to scare us into submission.”
“We are committed to protecting the men and women who make this state stronger through their hard work and entrepreneurial spirit,” Newsom wrote before pivoting to Trump’s ongoing attacks on university funding. “And when the President threatens to bankrupt UCLA — an engine of innovation and economic prosperity, a world leader in science and medicine — with his own bankrupt ideas, he will fail.”
California has led the way in building a green economy, Newsom said, pointing to more than2 million zero-emission vehicles sold in the state and 51 miles of Caltrain railroad tracks now electrified. The state’s grid has run for the equivalent of 60 full days using 100% clean electricity, he added.
“Our climate investments will create millions of new jobs and cut air pollution by more than 70%,” Newsom wrote. “In California, economic growth and environmental protection go hand in hand.”
Like past governors, he used the speech to underscore California’s outsized role in the national economy. With a gross domestic product topping $4.1 trillion, he said the state leads in startups, venture capital and space technology.
The governor closed on a note of defiance, promising to report next year — in what would be his final State of the State — that California is “brighter and more prosperous than ever before.”
