In August 2023, just four months after Sudan’s civil war erupted, I left Israel, my refuge country, for eastern Chad. Then, as a staff member of HIAS, the global Jewish humanitarian organization that has been serving Darfuri refugees in Chad since the first genocide of Darfur, I was deployed to join the emergency response. I stood at the Adre border crossing and watched wave after wave of people pour into Chad from Sudan: injured, barely clothed, barefoot, and carrying nothing but their children and the weight of unspeakable trauma. And there, on the Chadian side, I witnessed something I will never forget: Chadian soldiers greeting them with water, food, and quiet compassion, followed by the warm embrace of the local community in Adre. That border crossing was not just a point on a map; it was a lifeline. Today, it is closed. And the crisis I witnessed firsthand has only grown more devastating.

On March 19, 2026, as reported by  Reuters, the war came crashing across that border when a drone from Sudan struck the Chadian town of Tine during a Ramadan Iftar gathering, killing at least 17 civilians. In response, Chad’s President Mahamat Idriss Deby convened an emergency Defense and Security Council, ordered retaliation, and launched a security operation to seize weapons along the border region, shutting down the entire 1,300-kilometer boundary between the two countries.

What began in April 2023 as a power struggle between two Sudanese military factions has now spilled across an international boundary, and a neighboring state that has sheltered millions of Sudan’s displaced is preparing for retaliation after being attacked from Sudanese territory. The international community, which has watched this crisis worsen for three years, must act decisively to stop this escalation and end the war in Sudan before it becomes a regional conflict.

Chad: A Quiet Hero for Darfur’s Displaced People

For over two decades, Chad has been a lifeline for Sudanese civilians fleeing mass violence and genocide. Despite being........

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