Tigray conflict divides Ethiopian diaspora, complicating US policy

As if things weren’t complicated enough, many of her Ethiopian-American constituents who have long supported the congresswoman’s almost two-decade political career are no longer on speaking terms with each other.

Those tensions were apparent on a Friday afternoon in late July as the fractured community clamoured for a say in Bass’s pending House resolution condemning the violence.

To avoid a potential shouting match, Bass opted to hold not one but two Zoom sessions: one with supporters of Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed’s response to the conflict, the other with activists who accuse him of abetting genocide in Tigray.

Meanwhile ethnic lobbies critical of both Abiy and the Tigray People’s Liberation Front (TPLF) have launched their own advocacy campaigns to make sure attacks against their group aren’t swept under the rug.

“We were once one community,” attorney and human rights advocate