On 19 February 1937, two Eritreans made a failed assassination attempt on Rodolfo Graziani, the Viceroy of Italian East Africa and appointed Governor-General of Shewa during the Italian occupation of Ethiopia. In return, under "carte blanche" permission from the Federal Secretary , many Italian civilians, members of the military, and the paramilitary forces known as the Blackshirts conducted a three-day bloody reprisal in Addis Ababa. Known in Ethiopia as the Yekatit 12 massacre, it resulted in the killing of thousands of people and arrests of many Amhara aristocratic noblemen, about 400 of whom were subsequently deported to Rome, Longobucco, Mercogliano, Ponza, Tivoli, and Asinara, Italy.