By Megbaru Alemu Abate
August 27, 2025
(PhD student at The University of Queensland, Australia)
War has long been one of humanity’s most devastating undertakings. It destroys lives, shatters families, obliterates infrastructure, and sets nations back decades. To describe war as “holy” is to contradict the evidence of history. The First and Second World Wars together killed more than 80 million people and scarred generations. The wars in Vietnam, Korea, and the Middle East left deep psychological and political wounds.
Closer to my lifetime, I have witnessed the destruction of the Ethio–Eritrean war (1998–2000), which killed tens of thousands and displaced millions. In recent years, Ethiopia itself was torn apart by the Tigray war, provoked by the Abiy Ahmed administration and worsened by the stubbornness of the TPLF. Nearly one million people perished, making it one of the deadliest conflicts in the 21st century.
Globally, war continues to show its futility. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has flattened cities like Mariupol, displaced millions, and destabilized global food supplies. In Gaza, Israel’s bombardment has killed tens of thousands and turned once-vibrant neighbourhoods into graveyards.
And now, in Ethiopia’s Amhara and Oromia regions, the machinery of destruction has again been unleashed: drone strikes on civilian gatherings, arbitrary killings, forced disappearances, displacement, and humanitarian blockades.
War, therefore, is not holy. But history teaches us there are moments when survival leaves no alternative. When a people is targeted for extermination, when their very existence is criminalized, resistance ceases to be a choice and becomes a moral imperative. In such rare circumstances, one may argue that if any war can be holy, it is the war for survival. For the Amhara people, this is the stark reality.
The Historical Role of the Amhara People
To understand the Amhara cause, one must first appreciate the role of the Amhara in Ethiopia’s national story. Amhara identity is not separate from Ethiopia’s statehood; it is deeply woven into its history of resistance, state-building, and cultural life.
The Amhara, alongside other Ethiopian ethnic groups, stood against European colonization, most famously at the Battle of Adwa in 1896, where Ethiopia defeated Italy and became the only African country to resist colonization at the height of European imperialism. Under Emperor Menelik II, Ethiopia entered the modern age by building roads, introducing telecommunication, strengthening centralized governance, and expanding agriculture. Amhara scholars and clergy preserved Ethiopia’s literacy, writing system (ፊደል), liturgical traditions, and educational institutions. Amhara farmers cultivated the highlands, artisans contributed weaving (ሽመና), and civic leaders helped build Addis Ababa into a national capital.
The forced resettlements under the Derg regime scattered Amhara communities across Ethiopia. Yet wherever they went, they integrated through farming, intermarriage, culture, and community life. This made Amharas deeply connected to the land and peoples across Ethiopia, but it also exposed them to systemic targeting whenever ethnic politics flared.
Why the Amhara Cause Exists
Despite their contributions, the Amhara people have been repeatedly victimized, marginalized, and scapegoated in Ethiopia’s ethnicized political order. The grievances fuelling the Fano resistance are rooted in decades of violence, dispossession, and state neglect.
Ethnic Cleansing and Land Seizure:The TPLF’s control over Wolkait and Raya was marked by displacement, killings, and attempts to erase Amhara identity. In the Amhara region itself, communities were systematically denied access to essential services. Allegations also point to the deliberate withholding of critical medicines, such as anti-malarials, which led to preventable deaths. The author of this article personally witnessed, as a child, more than ten people dying of malaria every day in a small village — deaths that could have been prevented with timely treatment. Furthermore, there were reports of population-control measures and policies perceived as intentionally designed to reduce Amhara numbers.
Massacres and Brutality: Amharas have faced unimaginable cruelty in regions where they were minorities. In Benishangul Gumuz, Oromia, Somali, and Gurage zones, massacres occurred with frightening regularity. Women were mutilated, pregnant mothers cut open, and foetuses killed — acts designed not only to eliminate but to terrorize. Survivors recall harrowing stories, such as a young girl in Oromia who begged her killers, swearing, “ወላዊ ሁለተኛ አማራ አልሆንም” (“I wouldn’t be Amhara anymore if you spared me today”), but she was slaughtered, nonetheless.
Buses carrying Amhara passengers have been stopped, and travellers kidnapped or killed on their way to Addis Ababa. In recent years, under Aby Ahmed’ and Shimelis Abdisa’s administration, Amharas have been barred from entering the capital — a city they helped build — preventing students from meeting exam deadlines and patients from receiving medical care.
Drone Strikes and Extrajudicial Killings: Government forces have increasingly used drone warfare against civilians. Strikes have targeted funerals, markets, and religious gatherings in Finote Selam, Quarit, Dembecha, and Gedebye. In parallel, security forces have conducted house-to-house executions of students, clergy, and anyone suspected of supporting Fano.
Displacement and Humanitarian Breakdown: Over 4 million Amhara students are out of school due to the conflict. Health facilities have been converted into army camps. Urban renewal projects (corridor development) around Addis have disproportionately evicted Amhara families. Aid workers are attacked, and humanitarian corridors blocked.
Systemic Discrimination and Marginalization: Thousands of Amhara have been imprisoned without trial, crammed into unsanitary detention centers where cholera outbreaks spread. Travel restrictions, checkpoints, and arbitrary evictions target them specifically. Civil servants in Fano-controlled regions are denied salaries under accusations of “collaboration.”
Religious Persecution: Orthodox Christianity, central to Amhara identity, has also come under attack. Over 30 churches have been destroyed since 2018. Priests and laypeople alike have been massacred in Oromia, with the OLA accused of orchestrating violence against worshippers.
Government Negligence and Complicity: The Ethiopian government, instead of protecting Amhara civilians, has often been complicit. Warnings of massacres were ignored. In 2023, the Abiy administration disbanded the Amhara Special Forces, sparking widespread insecurity. Military campaigns against Fano militias have relied on indiscriminate violence, punishing entire communities.
Fano: The Meaning of Resistance
In this context, Fano emerged as a grassroots, youth-driven defense movement. The word Fano itself carries historical weight, recalling the Ethiopian patriots who resisted Italian colonization in the 1930s and 40s. Fano today sees itself as the inheritor of that tradition: ordinary people rising when the state fails to protect them.Fano is not fighting for conquest, wealth, or expansion. It is fighting for survival. Its weapons are crude compared to the drones and artillery of the Ethiopian army, yet its legitimacy comes from the desperation of its cause. When a people is cornered, resistance becomes not only justified but necessary.This is what sets the Amhara struggle apart. Other wars may be called ideological, political, or territorial. Fano’s war is existential: to live as Amhara without fear of extermination. If war can ever be called holy, it is this — a war of last resort, a war to protect one’s children from slaughter, one’s churches from destruction, one’s history from erasure.
A Call to the World
War is not holy. It is the sum of humanity’s failures. But there are rare moments when refusing to fight is to accept annihilation. The Amhara find themselves in such a moment. Their cause is not about supremacy; it is about survival. Their resistance is not against diversity; it is against erasure. Their fight is not to dominate Ethiopia; it is to continue being part of it. The international community must not turn away. Ethiopia’s allies, human rights organizations, and global institutions must recognize the scale of atrocities. Drone warfare against civilians, systemic discrimination, and ethnic cleansing cannot be normalized. If the world truly believes in “never again,” then the Amhara case must matter. For if war can ever be holy, it is the war of a people refusing to vanish in silence.