War has returned to northern Ethiopia, nearly four years after the Pretoria peace deal. The Northern Ethiopia War began on September 23, 2026, when an alliance of the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), Fano and other armed groups, formed three days earlier with the stated aim of overthrowing the federal government, attacked on the Kobo and Afar fronts and seized the airports at Mekelle, Shire and Aksum. Flights were suspended and telecommunications were cut. As of October 20, federal forces have retaken Mekelle and a string of towns near the Eritrean border, and Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has announced an interim government for Tigray.
Federal forces (ENDF) counterattacked within days, retaking Erebti, Soqota and Alamata on September 27–28. Alamata had been hit by federal drone strikes on September 22 that reportedly killed 14 civilians at a school, and at least 52 civilians were reportedly killed there during the fighting that followed. On October 1, drones struck near the Defense Ministry in Addis Ababa, and Eritrea severed diplomatic ties with Ethiopia. The TPLF withdrew from Mekelle on October 4, and air strikes killed at least 17 people in Adwa and Sheraro the next day, Reuters reported, citing an aid bulletin. Between October 7 and 12, Eritrean troops were reported inside Tigray, which the Ethiopian government called an "all-out invasion", as federal forces retook Adigrat, Adwa and Zalambessa. The Ethiopian military says about 270 Tigrayan fighters have been killed; there is no verified civilian death toll.
The fighting compounds an existing crisis. About 150,000 people were displaced in the first week, Valerie Browning of the aid group APDA told the Associated Press, and Médecins Sans Frontières said the number of wounded patients at hospitals in Korem and Alamata rose from about 180 to more than 420 in 48 hours. As of September, Tigray's Disaster Risk Management Commission counted about 900,000 people in 31 displacement camps and 3.9 million needing emergency food. As of October 10, the UN said its operations in northern Ethiopia were on hold, and aid depots in Mekelle have been looted.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Ethiopian Red Cross Society are delivering aid where they can. As of October 20, they had supplied 33 health facilities in Tigray with medicines and medical equipment, supported 32 health facilities in Amhara, and pre-positioned 6,000 household kits in Tigray and 2,000 in Amhara. On September 28, the ICRC facilitated the evacuation of 161 people from Mekelle to Semera, in Afar.
To help civilians caught in the fighting, visit the Northern Ethiopia War disaster page for responding organizations and donation links, or browse our list of disaster relief organizations.
