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On 28 February 2026, the Shajareh Tayyebeh girls' elementary school in Minab, Hormozgan province in southern Iran was destroyed during the school day, reportedly by a missile, during the first day of the Israeli–United States strikes on Iran. According to Iranian state media, 180 people were killed, the majority of whom were schoolchildren.[1][2][3] The attack was the single most deadly strike in the ongoing bombing campaign.[4][5]
The exact number of people killed has not yet been independently confirmed but video footage of the destroyed school was verified by multiple sources.[6][7] The attack was condemned by the Iranian government[8] and UNESCO.[9]
According to locals, the Shajareh Tayyebeh school in Minab was a former military facility converted into an all-girls elementary school.[11] At the time of the strikes, the school was located approximately 600 metres (660yd) away from the Sayyid al-Shuhada military complex which includes the headquarters of the Asif Brigade of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps Navy.[4][12][13][14] According to satellite imagery, the building in which the school was housed was initially walled within the IRGC compound in 2013 but was then walled off by September 2016.[4]Al Jazeera stated that the school that "had been separated from the military complex and had become a clearly defined civilian institution for more than 10 years".[14]The Guardian determined there was no indication it served a military purpose.[5]
Events
According to Iranian state media, amid the 28 February airstrikes across Iran, the Shajareh Tayyebeh school was struck by a missile.[15] The strikes, which began at around 10:00 a.m. local time, coincided with the time at which Iranians usually send their children to school, as Saturday is a working day in Iran.[16][5] The impact instantaneously killed dozens inside.[5] Human rights organization Hengaw stated that around 170 students were present in the school at the time,[16] among them mostly girls between seven and 12 years old.[17] Coordinating Council of Iranian Teachers' Trade Associations representative, Shiva Amelirad, said the school had decided to close soon after the strikes began, however parents were not able to reach the school before the airstrike landed on the compound.[11]
The school was struck at time point between 10:00 and 10:45a.m.[5][18] as classes were changing periods in the school. The impact impacted over half of the structure, destroying the walls of the building and caused its roof to collapse, burying people underneath;[16][17] graphic footage shows some bodies partly trapped.[5] On 1 March, BBC Persian and The Kashmir Observer published accounts of a clinic struck in the same location, which the former characterized as "what appeared to be a second attack on the same location" and the latter as a "follow-up attack", with the latter citing local officials.[19][20]The New York Times corroborated that smoke was billowing from two buildings.[4]
Scene at the school after the attack
Verification and death toll
While the Iranian government said the missile was a US-Israeli strike, Vice Governor of Hormozgan Ahmad Nafisi said the school was struck amidst Israeli air raids on Minab.[21] The school was reportedly located near an IRGC base which had been the target of another US-Israeli airstrike the same day.[14][12][15][16] Videos taken of the destroyed school immediately following the attack were verified by The New York Times,[16]The Washington Post,[7]Reuters, and Iranian fact-checking organization Factnameh, as authentic; these videos were compared against existing imagery of the school.[15]Drop Site News published accounts of the incident from several parents whose children were among those killed.[13]
The death toll, reported as 180 by Iranian state media, has not been independently confirmed.[1][2] A majority of those reportedly killed were schoolchildren,[1][2][3] but included teachers.[11] On 1 March, the day the search for survivors stopped, Shiva Amelirad, representing the Coordinating Council of Iranian Teachers’ Trade Associations, told TIME magazine that 108 or more children had been killed in the attack, according to sources within Minab she was in contact with. Minab's public prosecutor office reported later that day, through the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency (IRNA), that 150 "innocent school girls" were killed, with some still trapped under the rubble.[11]
False reports of the attack being a failed IRGC strike
Following the attack, Israeli and Iranian pro-Monarchist opposition pages began disseminating information that the airstrike was a failed IRGC interception. These claims originated from associated Telegram channels and were debunked.[22][14] It was also falsely claimed on the social media website X that the IRGC had admitted to mistakenly destroying the school in a missile strike, despite the fact that no such statement admitting responsibility had been made by the Iranian state.[23]
Aftermath and response
People search through rubble after the school airstrike (Mehr News)Another video of recovery efforts from Mehr News
As reports emerged that the school had been hit, many panicked locals, including family members of victims, rushed to the scene while security forces attempted to push families back, fearing the area would be targeted again, and sealed off the building.[13] Soon after, recovery efforts began—some informal—as civilians and Iranian Red Crescent Society emergency workers searched through the debris.[4] Although initially using just their hands,[13] rescue services used construction cranes and shovels to save people trapped by rubble,[16] while black smoke scorching the remaining walls continued to pour from the building's windows.[11][24] Footage reveals items including severed arms,[4] bodies, and school bags being recovered.[24][25] One video shows a man, previously digging through the rubble, waving dust-covered textbooks and worksheets; in a quote translated by The Guardian, he yelled:[5]
"These are the schoolbooks of the children who are under these ruins, under this rubble here," he shouts. "You can see the blood of these children on these books. These are civilians, who are not in the military. This was a school and they came to study."[5]
Corpses were collected in body bags and injured victims taken away in ambulances.[4] Later in the day of the airstrike, bodies of the victims were transferred to their relatives gathering at a nearby designated collection area.[13] The attack flooded Minab's morgues, however, forcing some of the bodies of victims to be held in refrigerated trucks.[11] The search for victims ended on 1 March.[4]
Mass funeral
Scene at the funeral for the victims
On 3 March, Iran held a mass funeral for the 165 schoolgirls killed in a public square in Minab, attended by thousands of residents. Those in attendance held imagery of the attack and phrases condemning what one victim's mother called "a document of American crimes."[26]
Reactions
Domestic
Seyed Abbas Araghchi
(@araghchi)
tweeted:
The destroyed building is a primary school for girls in the south of Iran. It was bombed in broad daylight, when packed with young pupils.
Dozens of innocent children have been murdered at this site alone.
These crimes against the Iranian People will not go unanswered.
President Masoud Pezeshkian said that "the American and Zionist aggression against Minab Elementary School will never be erased from the historical memory of our nation."[8] The spokesperson for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Iran called the strike a "blatant crime", adding that "the world must stand up to this great injustice. The UN Security Council must act now in line with its primary responsibility under the Charter."[28] Foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said the "crimes against the Iranian people will not go unanswered."[13] The spokesperson for Iran's Health Ministry, Hossein Kermanpour, called the report of the attack "the most bitter news" so far, adding that there may be even more bodies under the rubble.[15]
The head of Iran's Red Crescent, Pirhossein Kolivand, said the "unique and bitter incident" had "no comparison with any other incident" even outside of Iran, as he said no singular attack killed so many students simultaneously, "even in Gaza."[4]
International
United States
Captain Tim Hawkins, a spokesperson for the United States Central Command said on 1 March that "we are aware of reports concerning civilian harm resulting from ongoing military operations. We take these reports seriously and are looking into them. The protection of civilians is of utmost importance, and we will continue to take all precautions available to minimize the risk of unintended harm."[4][16] On 4 March, US Secretary of State, Marco Rubio, said the US Department of War was investigating whether the strike was fired by the US and added that the US "would not deliberately target a school."[26]
Intergovernmental organizations
In a statement, UNESCO condemned the strike, calling it "a grave violation of humanitarian law". United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres also condemned the strike.[9]
Activists and human rights organizations
The Euro-Mediterranean Human Rights Monitor described the attack as a "horrific crime and a consolidation of the collapse of civilian protection", and said that any attack on "protected persons" such as children and teaching staff constitutes a serious violation of international humanitarian law.[14]
Iran International described the Minab strike as "disputed", highlighting the use of school sites by the Iranian government. A day before the 2026 Iran conflict, The Coordinating Council of Iranian Teachers' Trade Associations published an image of the school being used to store military gear, warning that classrooms were becoming "shields for deadly equipment." On 3 March, a classroom in Tehran was used to host a press conference by the Iranian foreign ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei.[29]
An Al Jazeera investigation into the strike concluded thus:[14]
The attackers’ ability to spare newly established adjacent facilities (such as the Martyr Absalan clinic) and their glaring failure to avoid an elementary school operating at full capacity and packed with 170 girls leaves us with two scenarios, both unequivocally condemnatory: Either US and Israeli forces relied, in striking the vicinity of the Asif Brigade, on a very old, outdated intelligence target bank (dating to before 2013), which would constitute grave negligence and reckless disregard for civilian lives; or the strike was carried out deliberately and with prior knowledge to inflict maximum societal shock and undermine popular support for Iran’s military establishment.
Shannon Bosch, an associate professor of law at Edith Cowan University, questioned the application of human rights law on the attack, particularly regarding measures of precautionary distinction, proportionality, and military necessity by the perpetrator. Depending on independent findings on proportionality, Bosch characterized the airstrike as fitting in an "overwhelmingly compliant pattern of behaviour" in a phenomenon of the "death of international law."[24]
↑Mohamad El Chamaa (28 February 2026). "U.S. military investigating reports of fatal strike on Iranian girls' school". Washington Post. Archived from the original on 28 February 2026. Retrieved 28 February 2026. The semiofficial Mehr News Agency reported that at least 63 students were killed and another 60 were injured, adding that 170 pupils were at the school at the time of the attack. There was no independent confirmation of that report.
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