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When Sudan’s paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) stormed the besieged city of el-Fasher on October 26, Mabrooka’s husband and brother ran for their lives.

The plan was for them to head to Tawila – about 60 kilometres (37 miles) away – where Mabrooka would be waiting for them with her three small children. By sundown, they had still not arrived.

News spread that the RSF, which has been fighting a bitter war against the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF) since April 2023, was carrying out summary executions against the population of el-Fasher, which it accused of siding with its enemy. Mabrooka began fearing the worst.

Then, her phone rang.

A voice told Mabrooka to wire 14,000 Sudanese pounds ($23) – a hefty sum for displaced and destitute Sudanese families – to a bank account, which she suspected belonged to an RSF fighter.

“When I got the call, I was terrified and crying the whole time,” Mabrooka, 27, told Al Jazeera. “I knew they would for sure torture and kill them if I didn’t muster up the money.”

Kidnapping and ransom

Since the RSF captured the army’s last stronghold in the sprawling western region of Darfur, the group has carried out a series of atrocities, including execution, rape and mass looting, according to survivors and local monitors. The Sudan Doctors Network put the death toll from the RSF attack at 1,500 in the first few days after the city’s fall, but the true number could be far higher.

While acknowledging that some crimes have been committed by its forces, the RSF has largely denied some of the worst accusations against it, and insists that it is “liberating” territory.

But in el-Fasher, most of the victims have been from the mainly sedentary “non-Arab” population, who have lived in fear of the nomadic “Arab” fighters who comprise most of the RSF.

The targeted ethnic violence has forced tens of thousands of people to flee to neighbouring villages, but many people have been abducted for ransom by RSF fighters along the way.

According to local monitors, international non-government organisations, and victims’ families, it’s likely that thousands of people have desperately wired money straight to RSF fighters to national banks via banking applications.

Monitors told Al Jazeera that ransoms range from anywhere between $20 to $20,000.

“There is a large number among the displaced people who have been detained, and the RSF is asking for a really big amount from their families,” said Mohamed*, a local relief worker in Tawila with the Emergency Response Room (ERR), a grassroots initiative spearheading the aid response across Sudan.

Mathilde Vu, the Sudan advocacy manager for the Norwegian Refugee Council, told Al Jazeera that many civilians are reportedly being detained as they flee and asked to pay a “transportation fee” to reach Tawila.

Many children have been separated from their parents, as well as women and children from their husbands, she said.

In addition, the United Nations estimates that more than 70,000 people have been uprooted from el-Fasher since October 26 and that over 40,000 of them headed towards Tawila.

Of this number, Vu noted that only about 6,000 people have arrived in Tawila so far.

“This is a clear indicator that people are disappearing or are being held back,” she told Al Jazeera.

Ransom videos

Some families who lost touch with loved ones in el-Fasher received ransom videos from unidentified kidnappers.

Local monitors and global relief agencies, who asked to remain anonymous to protect their teams on the ground, said that RSF fighters appear to be the kidnappers in most cases.

However, criminal gangs and other “Arab” militias aligned with the RSF may also be implicated.

One video circulating over social media, which has been authenticated by Al Jazeera’s verification team, Sanad, showed a man being held for ransom.

In the video, Abbas al-Sadiq, who is a psychology professor at el-Fasher University, pleaded for one of his colleagues to pay a ransom that amounts to roughly $3,330.

“Please wire the money to the [account] number I sent you and please do it now because we don’t have a lot of time. They are just giving me 10 minutes,” said al-Sadiq in the video.

Noon Baramaki, a journalist from el-Fasher, told Al Jazeera that al-Sadiq was released on Saturday after his ransom was paid. A colleague of al-Sadiq also reported on social media that al-Sadiq has been released, but Al Jazeera has been unable to reach him.

Baramki stressed that countless other people have been abducted, yet their families are scared to speak to the press out of fear that the RSF will somehow find out and then kill their loved ones.

“People are really scared to make any statements because they don’t want to be the reason that anyone they love gets hurt or killed,” Baramki told Al Jazeera.

Reunited

A number of news reports have documented that the RSF and allied gangs are executing people who can’t pay the ransoms that have been demanded.

For most families in el-Fasher – who for 18 months were living under a brutal RSF siege that led to a famine – paying a ransom that is thousands or even hundreds of dollars is extremely difficult if not impossible.

Mabrooka, whose husband and brother were abducted, considers herself lucky. She said that she relied on donations from friends and family members in Tawila in order to promptly gather 12,000 Sudanese pounds ($20), which the kidnappers accepted.

Once the money was wired, her brother and husband were released on November 1. They managed to make it to Tawila despite limping and staggering from the exhaustion and beatings they endured in captivity, as well as from the lack of food and water they were given.

“When they finally arrived in Tawila, I cried and cried and cried tears of joy. I remember hugging them and greeting them,” Mabrooka told Al Jazeera. “Thank God they made it.”

While she is now reunited with her husband and brother, she said they are still living in fear.

The family believes that the RSF could soon attack Tawila next to continue to persecute non-Arabs and finish off what many relief agencies, monitors and experts are describing as a possible genocide.

“Honestly, we are terrified that after the RSF finishes off el-Fasher, they’ll come after us here,” Mabrooka said.

“We are scared,” she told Al Jazeera. “Thank God [my husband and brother] returned, but people here are still scared.”

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Al Jazeera’s journalists risk everything to report on Israel’s war on Gaza, enduring adversity, displacement, and the deaths of their colleagues and families.

Beirut, Lebanon – An Israeli air strike on southern Lebanon has killed one person and wounded another, Lebanon’s Ministry of Public Health says, as Israel ramps up its cross-border attacks in defiance of a ceasefire.

The ministry said in a statement on Wednesday that an “Israeli enemy raid” struck a car in the town of Burj Rahal in the southern district of Tyre.

“The attack resulted in the martyrdom of one citizen and the injury of another”, the statement read, without identifying the dead.

Lebanon’s National News Agency said the attack happened near a school, triggering panic among students and prompting parents to rush to collect their children amid scenes of fear and chaos.

Ceasefire under strain

The Israeli military did not immediately comment on the strike, which was the latest in a series of its attacks across southern Lebanon, despite a ceasefire signed on November 27, 2024.

Israeli forces remain deployed in at least five areas of Lebanon’s south as they carry out near-daily air raids that Israel says target Hezbollah fighters and infrastructure.

On Monday, two people were killed and seven wounded in separate attacks in southern Lebanon. A day earlier, Israeli raids in Nabatieh killed four people, according to Lebanon’s Health Ministry.

Inside Lebanon, the continued bombardment has heightened fears of a renewed war, as Israeli and United States officials press the Lebanese government to force Hezbollah to disarm.

Israeli military intelligence has claimed in recent days that Hezbollah is attempting to rebuild its military capabilities. A Hezbollah spokesperson denied reports of expanded military activity or attempts to restore its elite units.

“Israel fabricates stories and claims to justify its attacks”, the spokesperson told Lebanon’s L’Orient Today newspaper on Monday.

Hezbollah was severely weakened after the Israeli escalation in September 2024, which killed its longtime leader, Hassan Nasrallah. Since the November ceasefire, the group has responded to Israeli attacks only once.

Hezbollah officials have repeatedly said the group will not disarm, saying that relinquishing its weapons would leave southern Lebanon exposed to an Israeli invasion.

Baalbek still under fire

Nearly a year after Israel’s wide-scale bombing campaign across Lebanon, residents in the eastern Bekaa Valley say they are still living under persistent Israeli threats.

In Baalbek, a city known for its Roman ruins and considered part of Hezbollah’s heartland, Israeli strikes continue to target what the Israeli military describes as Hezbollah’s “logistical and operational base”.

But many civilians also remain under constant bombardment.

“What is happening now isn’t short of a war. It is a war”, Abu Ali, a resident of Baalbek, told Al Jazeera. “There is so much talk about targeting Baalbek, and this is scaring people away”, added another resident, Ali Chokair.

Much of the Bekaa region remains scarred by last year’s Israeli strikes, leaving one of Lebanon’s poorest areas struggling to rebuild.

Lebanon under pressure to negotiate

Israeli and US officials are pressing for Hezbollah’s disarmament, with US ambassador Tom Barrack urging the armed group to begin a dialogue with Israel.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned on Sunday that the army would “act as necessary” if Lebanon failed to ensure Hezbollah handed over its weapons.

“We expect the Lebanese government to fulfil its commitment – to disarm Hezbollah – but it is clear we will exercise our right of self-defence under the terms of the ceasefire”, he said.

Lebanese President Joseph Aoun has said the country has “no choice but to negotiate” with Israel to avoid a wider conflict. But many in Baalbek and southern Lebanon oppose any talks that could lead to Hezbollah’s disarmament,

Hussein Osman, who runs a restaurant in Baalbek, refused to flee when the Israeli army ordered residents to leave during last year’s war. Like many Hezbollah supporters, he questions Lebanon’s decision to negotiate with Israel, which is attacking the region almost every day.

“We would support any negotiation that works for the benefit of the resistance”, he said. “But any negotiation that involves disarming the resistance is not accepted … These weapons protect us and allowed us to stay in our homes”.

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