Thus, the statement that Egypt was not the only route is incorrect. It was the primary route through which Arabs entered Sudan. Other groups penetrated from the Red Sea in the early years of the Islamic states. The historian al-Tabari mentioned that the Companion Abu Mihjan al-Thaqafi fled to the port of Suakin, near Aqiq, in 32 AH/637 CE. He also mentioned that Caliph Abu Bakr al-Siddiq exiled a group of Arabs to the area of Aidhab. In that early era, clashes occurred between Abyssinian pirates and Muslims. The Umayyads, and after them the Abbasids, used the island of Dahlak as a place of exile for undesirable Arab elements. This facilitated rapid contact. Thus, Dahlak and Massawa were ports for the northern part of Abyssinia, and Baḍiʿ and Aidhab were main entrances to the land of the Beja. Furthermore, Arab merchants conducted their trade in those regions.

From here, Arabism was strengthened by their integration with the inhabitants of that image, which perhaps indicates that the Arabs were able to carry the banner of Arabism in those regions where they settled. The settlement of Arabs in this manner in those regions, and subsequently the Arab Islamic emirates and sultanates, enriched the movement of Arab migration and the effective role played by the Arabs in the Nile Valley of Sudan. This influenced the movements of Arab tribes within the various Sudanese regions and expanded the migration movement to the south, to the southern provinces such as the Equatorial Province and Bahr al-Ghazal Province. This led to interaction between the cultures of Arabism and Islam and other local cultures, which dissolved into Arab and Islamic existence, even if they still retained some of their local characteristics. Thus, the Arabs had to enter the interior regions of Sudan, especially those southern regions with large populations and suitability for Islamic da'wah and the spread of Arabism and Islam. From here, Muslims and Arabs made their way into the heart of Sudan, to the equatorial regions and the southern forest areas.

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