Sudan's paramilitary Rapid Support Force (RSF) killed at least 124 people in El Gezira

Gezira: Sudan's paramilitary Rapid Support Force (RSF) killed at least 124 people in El Gezira on Friday, activists said, in one of the deadliest incidents of the 18-month war and the biggest of several attacks.

Last Sunday, after top RSF officer Abugla Kaykal surrendered to the army, pro-democracy activists launched RSF retaliatory attacks in the state, killing and imprisoning civilians and displacing thousands. "The RSF militia raids in East, West and Central Gezira and commits widespread massacres in one village after another," the committee said. Images on social media shared by the committee and others show dozens of bodies being wrapped for burial and mass graves being dug.

"The people of Gezira are facing genocide by the Rapid Support Force, unable to treat the injured or even evacuate them for treatment. Those who went on foot died or faced death," the Sudanese Doctors' Union said. Calling for safe passage. Sudan's Unit Against Violence Against Women, a government agency, said in a statement that it had received reports of RSF soldiers raping women in Gezira villages as a tactic to humiliate men and drive people out of the area. Keikal's defection comes as the army renews its drive to retake territory across the country.

Gezira has already faced a months-long offensive, residents said, with RSF looting homes, killing scores of civilians and displacing hundreds of thousands. The worst of the recent violence was in the village of El Gezira in the north of the state, where 124 people were killed and 100 wounded in an RSF raid, the Wad Madani Resistance Committee, a pro-democracy group, said on Saturday.

In a statement on Friday, RSF accused the military of arming civilians in Gezira and using troops led by Kaycalin to incite attacks. The Army and RSF did not respond to requests for comment.

RSF has seized control of large parts of Sudan in a conflict with the military that the United Nations says has fueled one of the world's worst humanitarian crises. The war displaced more than 11 million people and left parts of the country in dire straits or starvation. 

The offensive began as tensions between the RSF and the army, who previously shared power, erupted into open conflict as Sudan was due to transition to civilian rule after a 2021 coup.

Sudanese Army General Abdel Fattah Al-Burhan posted on X late Friday that as more civilian blood was spilled, the Sudanese people's resolve to resist the RSF grew stronger. But his comments drew criticism that the military had not protected civilians in Gezira or elsewhere in the country.

Sudan, officially the Republic of the Sudan, is a country in Northeast Africa. It borders the Central African Republic to the southwest, Chad to the west, Libya to the northwest, Egypt to the north, the Red Sea to the east, Eritrea and Ethiopia to the southeast, and South Sudan to the south.