{"id":179864,"date":"2026-10-30T09:47:12","date_gmt":"2026-10-30T13:47:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/?p=179864"},"modified":"2026-10-30T09:47:12","modified_gmt":"2026-10-30T13:47:12","slug":"drone-strike-on-a-south-wollo-camp-for-people-driven-out-of-wollega-killed-18-residents-and-a-hospital-source-tell-bbc","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.zegabi.com\/articles\/179864","title":{"rendered":"Drone Strike on a South Wollo Camp for People Driven Out of Wollega Killed 18, Residents and a Hospital Source Tell BBC"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Torn<\/p>\n

Wrecked tarpaulin shelters at the Jari camp for displaced people near Hayk, South Wollo, in a photo from Yared\u2019s Oct. 29 post on X. The photo has not been independently verified. Photo: Yared (@YaredMEHAR3871) via X<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

A drone strike on a camp in South Wollo that has sheltered Amhara families driven out of Oromia\u2019s Wollega for about four years killed 18 people, among them children and pregnant women, on Thursday, three people living in the camp and a hospital source told BBC Amharic<\/a>.<\/p>\n

The camp, known as Jari No. 2 and locally as the \u201cTurkish camp,\u201d sits in Tehuledere woreda near the town of Hayk in the Amhara region. Residents told the BBC the strike came at about five o\u2019clock in the day by the Ethiopian clock, around 11 in the morning, and two of them said the drone struck at least four times, 15 to 20 minutes apart, hitting the tarpaulin shelters where the families live. \u201cFive drones were dropped. All five landed on the tarpaulin houses, the houses burned, people burned and died,\u201d one displaced man told the BBC in Amharic. Another said the strikes fell \u201cinside the IDP camp, right on the tarpaulin, on the camp. They were in their homes.\u201d<\/p>\n

Residents said at least 16 people died in the camp itself, and a hospital source told the BBC that two more of the wounded died, one who was dead on arrival and one on the way to Dessie after being referred there. The source said 36 wounded people reached Hayk Primary Hospital at about eight o\u2019clock by the Ethiopian clock, around 2 p.m., among them eight children as young as three and about 10 women, and that 12 of the most badly hurt were sent on to Dessie with heavy bleeding, head injuries and broken bones. One resident said three pregnant women and three students were among the dead and that one of the women died together with her five-year-old child.<\/p>\n

The 16 who died at the camp were buried on Thursday in a single grave inside the camp, the three residents said. \u201cBecause we cannot go outside [the camp], we wrapped them in tarpaulin and buried them, because their hands and their legs had fallen apart,\u201d one of them told the BBC. Many families have since left the camp, they said.<\/p>\n

Displaced people at the camp gave DW Amharic<\/a> a slightly lower count on Thursday, saying the drone and artillery attack killed 14 people and wounded 22, and on Friday they told DW<\/a> that two of the wounded had died, bringing the dead to 16. A mother told DW the strike came as parents were walking their children home from school. \u201cI had gone to school and was bringing my children back when it happened. I saved one child, but the other was hit on her hand,\u201d she said. Addis Standard Amharic<\/a> also reported 16 killed and 22 wounded at the Hayk Jari 2 site. Zegabi has not independently confirmed the toll.<\/p>\n

Accounts differ on whether there was fighting nearby. Residents told DW that Fano forces move around the camp and that they believed the strike may have been aimed at the surrounding area, and DW said on Friday that the attack was reported to have been carried out on the grounds that Fano forces operate in the area. The three residents who spoke to the BBC said that although Fano forces fight government troops in nearby places, there was no fighting on the day of the strike.<\/p>\n

No one has claimed the strike. The BBC said its phone call and written questions to the army\u2019s communication chief, Col. Biresaw Shiferaw, got no immediate answer and that it could not reach Ali Mekonnen, the chief administrator of South Wollo zone. DW said no side had issued a statement and that the Ethiopian Government had said nothing publicly by Friday. The BBC noted that the federal government in Addis Ababa, which uses drones in its fight against armed groups, has repeatedly denied past reports that its strikes harmed civilians.<\/p>\n

The Amhara Fano National Movement said in a statement on Friday, posted by Zegabi Media<\/a>, that more than 61 displaced people were killed at Jari and more than 123 badly wounded, figures far higher than those residents gave the BBC and DW. The movement blamed the government for the strike and said that on the same day a drone strike on a site in Gonch Siso Enese woreda in East Gojjam, where Fano forces were holding captives, killed five former officials of the ruling Prosperity Party and badly wounded about nine others, and that a school in Enemay woreda was destroyed. It said the killings in Wollega, Arsi and Jari were \u201csufficient proof\u201d that the government was \u201canti-people.\u201d Neither claim could be independently confirmed.<\/p>\n

The strike comes three years into the war between the federal government and Fano forces in Amhara. The UN said drone strikes killed at least 15 civilians in eastern Amhara in a single week this month, as Zegabi reported<\/a>, and a strike on a school in South Gondar\u2019s Dera killed at least six children, Addis Standard reported, as Zegabi noted<\/a>. DW said on Friday that ground fighting in North and South Wollo, North Shewa and South Gondar had eased in recent days apart from occasional gunfire, but that drone surveillance and strikes were continuing in several parts of the region. Residents of towns in Shewa and in North and South Wollo have also told DW Amharic that banks have closed or stopped paying out cash, Mereja TV noted<\/a>.<\/p>\n

On X, the strike drew anger in Amharic within hours. Yared (@YaredMEHAR3871<\/a>), who posted the photos of the wrecked shelters, wrote that the camp holds \u201cdisplaced Amharas who survived the massacre in Wollega because of their identity\u201d and that \u201ctoday the regime massacred them with a drone attack.\u201d In a reply thread, the account @AfcRoBel (post<\/a>) wrote that \u201cso far no one has taken responsibility\u201d and that \u201cthere is strong suspicion that it is a government drone,\u201d and later added<\/a> that the TPLF, which he called Woyane, and others also have drones, \u201cbut most of the suspicion leans toward government drones.\u201d Habtish Gurmu (@Habtishgreat<\/a>), whose X bio calls the account commentary and parody and describes him as an East Africa political analyst, blamed instead \u201cTsimdo,\u201d which he described as \u201ca coalition of the TPLF and Amhara FANO National Movement.\u201d In Tigrigna, the account Fenqel Eri media (@TedrosGebrekid4<\/a>) wrote that the ruling party had bombed a refugee shelter and called it \u201ca backward system that destroys its people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Sources<\/strong><\/p>\n