What Happened?

Since the start of the ongoing war on Tigray, the usage of hate crimes and hate speech has exasperated from ethnic-based discrimination trickling outside of Tigray into other parts of Ethiopia and to the diaspora. In addition, the use of hate crimes and hate speech has led to arbitrary mass arrests of ethnic Tigrayans throughout Ethiopia, firing from their jobs​, bank accounts frozen, and targeting of Ethnic Tigrayans across the U.S.

On March 16th, 5 ethnic Tigrayans attended a counterprotest with over 500 attendees supporting the war on Tigray and the Ethiopian government in front of Representative Karen Bass's Los Angeles office. In the video recording, you can see the minute the group of 5 began to express their concerns regarding the man-made famine and humanitarian crisis in Tigray, the mob of protestors became infuriated. The mob of protestors surrounded and attacked the 5 individuals with their poll sticks, with Ethiopia's national flag attached. The angry mob shouted hate rhetoric such as "Junta" and other insults used on the Tigray region's grounds, as shown in a video recording by CNN during extrajudicial killings and ethnic cleansing of Tigrayans. On April 24th, a man pulled a gun out on a young unarmed woman after hurling derogatory insults at her and other protestors on Little Ethiopia st., Los Angeles, CA. Los Angeles Police arrested the man. On July 1st, in Fairfax County, Virginia, two ethnic Tigrayans were intentionally run over after leaving a Tigrayan owned restaurant by a vehicle. In the video recording of the immediate aftermath, you can see two men hovering over one of the victims holding a chair over his head, and the other male kicks him. Two females who recorded the video were heard conversing in Amharic, stating," I'm disgusted by dead bodies," "should I call 911," the other female said something in the sort of stop it and "I look good as usual." The motive for the attack should be taken into consideration as the victim has lived in the DMV area for over 30 years, is known in the community, and advocates for Tigrayan human rights.

Resentment against Tigray is also being unleashed in state-sponsored media and social media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram towards ethnic Tigrayans. They contribute to the false, inflammatory, and vindictive narratives circulating online to villainize ethnic Tigrayans and incite violence. Social media is also being used to bully ethnic Tigrayans and advocates that speak out about humanitarian needs and grievous ethnic motivated attacks on the civilian population in Tigray. Victims of grievous war crimes and crimes against humanity are being tormented on social media outlets; by people through bot social media accounts attempting to justify the attacks through hate speech in elaborate coordination to change the narrative. Recently bot accounts associated with the Information Network Security Agency in Ethiopia were removed by Facebook for posting fake and misleading coordinated information in Amharic. We call on Facebook and Instagram to use similar tactics in thoroughly investigating hate speech and misleading information relating to the victims of the war in Tigray and the population and ethnic Tigrayans throughout the diaspora. 

Call to Action

• We call on the Los Angeles District Attorney, George Gascon, Los Angeles Police Department, including the District attorney, and police department in Fairfax County, Virginia, to classify and investigate these crimes as hate crimes. 
• We call on the Representatives in districts where the incidents occurred and members of the House of Foreign Committee and Africa Subcommittee to condemn hate speech usage and targeting of Tigrayans from Ethiopia to the US.  Including the dangers associated with criminal acts of targeting individuals /groups because of their ethnicity to its constituents. 
• We call on Facebook, Instagram, and Twitter to take action and remove accounts using violent and dehumanizing hate speech to attack ethnic Tigrayans, in violation of your community standards.