UC Berkeley professor Scott Straus talks about conflicts in Sudan during the annual Holocaust Memorial Lecture Nov. 10. (Peter Eiswert | Student Life) 

UC Berkeley professor Scott Straus urged the WashU and international community to bear witness to the events and possible genocide in Sudan during his Holocaust Memorial Lecture on Nov. 10. 

Straus, Chair of the Department of Political Science at UC Berkeley, is a leading scholar of genocide and political violence. Straus has focused his career on studying the violent conflicts of Sub-Saharan Africa.

“I’m here tonight with a very heavy heart,” Straus began. “[In the] two weeks prior to my arriving here in St. Louis we [watched] an unfolding mass killing event happening in western Sudan … we are witnessing a mass atrocity event happening right now.” 

Straus cited empirical evidence, including reported deaths numbering over 150,000, throughout his lecture that pointed to the classification of the events in Sudan as a genocide.

“There also seems to be this group selective or ethnic dimension to what’s going on, which is why I say it could be part of a genocide or part of genocidal massacre,” Straus said.

Straus also remarked on the limited response from the international community to the conflict in Sudan.

“[There is a] silence about what’s happening in Sudan and … I don’t think it’s getting the attention that it deserves,” Straus said. “Part of my objective this evening is to [call] attention and shine a light on what’s happening.” 

While not addressed in vocal campus protests or demonstrations, the WashU Muslim Students Association is hosting a roundtable discussion on media representation and advocacy surrounding Sudan on Thursday, Nov. 13. 

Despite this media silence, Straus called attention to the robust local effort made by Sudanese organizations to stabilize communities during the humanitarian crisis.

“There is in Sudan, extraordinary civil society, an extraordinary tradition of medical support and medical staff, and they have really borne the brunt of the provision of assistance. There was some hope that the Emergency Response Rooms might have gotten the Nobel Prize this year … That’s the scale of bravery, of courage, and assistance that’s going on.”

Straus began his talk by providing historical context to what Erin McGlothin, Straus’ introducer and Chair of the Holocaust Memorial Committee, called a “horrific escalation” to the multi-year long conflict in Sudan in these last couple weeks. Straus described the conflict’s origins as well as the country’s geopolitical history.

“The crisis started in April of 2023 and really boils down to a power struggle of two men and the networks around them who want power, who want control of Sudan,” Straus said. 

He was referring to General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan, the leader of the Sudanese Armed Forces (SAF), the official military of Sudan, and Lieutenant General Mohamad Hamdan Dagalo Musa (Hemedti), the leader of the Rapid Support Forces (RSF), a powerful Sudanese paramilitary group. 

“What happened is that we had the civilian transition government, then it was overthrown by the RSF and the army collaborating, and then the army and this RSF fell out, and that’s why we have the civil war we have today,” Straus said. 

Straus then continued his lecture by outlining the origins of the RSF in the Janjaweed paramilitary group and their role in the 2003 conflict in Darfur as it becomes significant to their role in the violence today. 

“[Sudan] provided [the Janjaweed] with military equipment, with training, and then air support, and the Janjaweed and the military, who were then acting in coordination, essentially laid waste to Darfur in the early 2000s and they were targeting non-Arab populations.” 

The Janjaweed’s specific targeting of non-Arab populations is relevant to understanding the complex racial dynamics at play in Sudan. Professor Straus describes these dynamics as a possible motivating factor in the conflict.

“There is definitely cleavage between those who claim Arab descent and those who don’t. Those who claim Arab descent in general are engaged in animal husbandry … or semi-nomadic livelihoods, and those who identify as non-Arab are often engaged in agriculture and more sedentary livelihoods.” 

Straus also spoke about the possible impact that climate change has had in stirring dissent. 

“And there has been, in addition to the livelihood question, kind of struggles for who should have power in Darfur. Now this, that cleavage is underpinned by droughts in the area, which is likely related to climate change. So there’s a kind of climate story lurking here.” 

Straus spoke about the overlapping crises and atrocities happening simultaneously in Sudan.

“You have just a kind of general humanitarian crisis that’s related to the war, but you also have these kind of very specific mass atrocities, and in particular kind of group-targeted or ethnic massacres that are going on that are happening primarily inside of Darfur, combined with … widespread sexual violence, extrajudicial killings, and so forth.”

Straus continues by saying there is no clear distinction between “good” and “bad” guys in this conflict. 

“The RSF is primarily responsible for the majority of the atrocities, but the SAF, the Sudanese Armed Forces, have also committed atrocities.”

The lecture then moved to the question of whether the events within the Darfur region of Sudan constitute genocide. Straus cited former Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s Genocide Determination, as well as evidence from Human Rights Watch, which point to violence at the scale of a genocide. Straus summarizes this evidence in his lecture. 

“RSF fighters killed around 15,000 civilians over the course of several weeks, and they specifically were going house to house, looking for Massalits and often killing them on the spot … What we observed in El Geneina was … that the Massalit [were] being specifically targeted, and often targeted for murder on a very large scale,” Straus said.

Straus continued his discussion on the escalation of conflict in Sudan with an explanation of the sudden media attention on El Fasher. El Fasher is located in west Sudan as part of the Darfur region, and was a western foothold for the SAF.

“Then you had El Fasher, and RSF laid siege to the city for 18 months, and it was a brutal siege. They created an earthen berm around the whole city with one exit route. And when people would go through that exit route, they would often be kind of harassed again, all these things, ransom, torture, sexual violence, etc. And the people who were stuck in the city were being bombed and being starved.” 

When the SAF pulled out of the city in retreat and concession of the territory on Oct. 26, 2025, the RSF quickly moved in and took control. During this control, residents unable to leave the city have faced ongoing fighting and poor humanitarian conditions.

“We have been observing extraordinary atrocities since then … a lot of what we’re observing are sort of trophy videos, celebrations on social media, of RSF fighters, essentially killing people, massacring people,” Straus said.

Using the projector, Straus displayed satellite images sourced by the Yale Humanitarian Research Lab that appear to show piles of bodies and blood-stained sand. 

“Now this is combined with eyewitness testimony, which has basically been describing that RSF soldiers are going house to house and killing people in these areas,” Straus said. 

Straus then took a step back from the current events to provide perspective on the conflict and the broader machine of genocide. 

“What is the most common condition in which we see genocide and mass atrocity? And I would say it’s armed conflict that when you have either an interstate war, but in particular a civil war, … alongside a kind of ideology of Arab supremacy, which has been dominant in Sudan for a long period of time.”

Straus connects this ignorance to a charge, a plea, for one to bear witness to the atrocities committed across the globe. 

“It is important to be thinking about the question of resisting indifference and bearing witness to atrocities where they occur, and in particular to these kinds of atrocities, group selective, ethnically targeted, mass killing on a large scale,” Straus said.

Circling back to the nature of the lecture, Straus related the events in Sudan to the Holocaust. 

“There is a direct line there between the Holocaust and what we’re observing in Sudan. And I think it’s important to remember that.”