US struck Iranian school that killed 165, further investigation suggests

Jerusalem: The investigative group Bellingcat says the newly released video “appears to contradict” US President Donald Trump‘s claim that Iran was responsible for an explosion at an Iranian school that killed over 165 people at the start of the war raging in the Mideast.

It comes as mounting evidence points to US culpability for the February 28 strike, which hit a school adjacent to a Revolutionary Guard base in Minab, Iran, in the country’s southern Hormozgan Province. Experts interviewed by The Associated Press, citing satellite image analysis, say the school was likely struck amid a quick succession of bombs dropped on the compound.

The video shared by Bellingcat is a three-second clip of a video taken the day the school was struck and circulated Sunday by Iran’s semiofficial Mehr news agency. The video shows a munition falling on a building, sending a dark plume into the air that mingles with smoke that likely came from earlier strikes on the compound. Trevor Ball, a Bellingcat researcher, geolocated the video to a site near the school, something also done by the AP.

Ball identified the munition as a Tomahawk cruise missile, which only the US is known to possess in this war. It’s the first evidence of a munition used in the strike. US Central Command has acknowledged using Tomahawk missiles in this war and even released a photo of the United States Ship (USS) Spruance, part of the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier group located within range of the school, firing a Tomahawk missile on Feb. 28.

Complicating any assessment of the incident is the lack of images of bomb fragments from the blast. No independent agency has reached the site during the war to investigate.

When asked by a reporter on Saturday, March 8, whether the US was responsible for the blast, which killed mostly children, Trump responded, without providing evidence: “No, in my opinion, based on what I’ve seen, that was done by Iran.” Trump added that Iran is “very inaccurate” with their munitions. Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth quickly chimed in to say the US was investigating.

Janina Dill, an expert on international law at Oxford University, wrote on X that even if the strike was a misidentification — and the attacker believed that the school had been a part of the neighbouring IRGC base — it would still be “a very serious violation of international law.”

“Attackers are under an obligation to do everything feasible to verify the status of the targeted object,” she wrote.

Several factors point to a US strike

One is the launching of an assessment of the incident by the US military. According to the Pentagon’s instructions on processes for mitigating civilian harm, an assessment is launched after a group of investigators makes an initial determination that the US military may bear culpability.

A US official told the AP that the strike was likely US. The official spoke anonymously because they were not authorised to comment publicly on the sensitive matter.

Another is the location of the school — next to the Revolutionary Guard base and close to barracks for a naval unit. The US military has focused on naval targets and acknowledged strikes in the province, including one in the vicinity of the school. Israel, which has denied conducting the strike, has focused on areas of Iran closer to Israel and hasn’t reported any strikes south of Isfahan, 800 kilometres (500 miles) away.

Neither the US military’s Central Command nor the Israeli military immediately replied to requests for comment Monday, March 9, from the AP on Bellingcat’s analysis.

Speaking about the US operation at a press conference on March 2, Hegseth said: “America, regardless of what so-called international institutions say, is unleashing the most lethal and precise air power campaign in history.”

“No stupid rules of engagement,” he said. “No politically correct wars. We fight to win, and we don’t waste time or lives.”