Is there a reason why this is still open? GNU intlfonts is a GNU package, and we have been hosting it since several years.

The Information for Maintainers of GNU Software says,

You should maintain a proper copyright notice and a license notice in each nontrivial file in the package.
...
Some formats do not have room for textual annotations; for these files, state the copyright and copying permissions in a README file in the same directory.

The format of the file in question does allow for comments, so it should include them.

The GPL Howto explains why:

...programmers often copy source files from one free program into another. If a source file contains no statement about what its license is, then moving it into another context eliminates all trace of that point. This invites confusion and error.

I believe this applies to a font file quite well, even better than to a typical source file of a program: people can copy it alone as is, and it will provide a set of characters for them.

Anyway, the README file in Ethiopic/ doesn't really contain valid copyright and license notices, either.

P.S. After a closer look, I realized that I can't tell the intended licensing conditions of those files based on the contents of the tarball: the README in the topmost directory only says that they are public domain or "freely usable", and Ethiopic/README says "GNU Copyleft" which is more than ambiguous; if they are copylefted with a GNU license, the (re-)distributor must provide the source file for ethio24f-uni.bdf, that is, ethio300-uni.bdf, but that file is absent from the tarball; in other words, the tarball may be technically unredistributable.

Files like Ethiopic/ethio12-uni.bdf lack valid copyright and license notices; please make sure that every copyrightable file has them.