Rescue workers and residents search through the rubble in the aftermath of the strike on Shajareh Tayyebeh primary school. Photograph: AP
Trump has blamed Iran for the mass killing at Shajareh Tayyebeh primary school but geolocation, videos and satellite imagery indicate otherwise
The bombing of a primary school in Minab on 28 February killed scores of people, most of them seven- to 12-year-old girls. The strike is the worst mass killing of the US and Israel’s war on Iran so far – and has been described by Unesco as a “grave violation” of international law.
On Saturday, the US president, Donald Trump, declared that Iran was responsible for the school bombing. “In my opinion, based on what I’ve seen, that was done by Iran … they’re very inaccurate, as you know, with their munitions. They have no accuracy whatsoever. It was done by Iran.”
The president presented no evidence for his claim. His assertion has not been repeated by spokespeople for the US military, who have said only that they are “investigating” the bombing.
But a growing body of evidence indicates that the strike on the Shajareh Tayyebeh primary school was carried out by the US. Here is what we know – and why it points to the US being responsible.
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White House wages online propaganda campaign with aggressive and tasteless videos seemingly designed for young rightwing American men
Trump with Jeffrey Epstein in 1997; plumes of smoke from US and Israeli strikes on Tehran. Composite: Getty Images, Middle East Images, AFP
White House wages online propaganda campaign with aggressive and tasteless videos seemingly designed for young rightwing American men
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Over the past couple of days, the White House and officials affiliated with the Trump administration have shared on X a series of hype videos that aggressively, and tastelessly, show off deadly combat footage from the strikes on Iran, sometimes in combination with footage from fictional movies and video games.
The videos are short, rapidly edited, and seem designed to appeal to the attention spans and tastes of Gen Z males fond of video-game trash-talk – though it is unclear whether those Gen Z males universally appreciate the Trump administration’s narrowly tailored jingoism.
One video, released on Thursday and captioned “JUSTICE THE AMERICAN WAY”, is less than a minute long but manically mixes footage from iconic action movies such as Braveheart, Gladiator, and Iron Man with apparently real footage of American ordnance striking Iranian military targets. Pulsing, fast-paced electronic dance music plays in the background as Russell Crowe, in Gladiator, says, “Strength and honor,” and a face-painted Mel Gibson, in Braveheart, demands: “What will you do without freedom?”
(It is unclear if the White House obtained permissions for the film and music in these clips, though it seems not.)
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Americans are overwhelmingly skeptical of the strikes on Iran, according to a recent NPR/PBS/Marist survey, with just 36% of the public saying that they approve of Trump’s handling of the war. The White House’s own messaging has been confusing and tautological.
Rather than try to persuade the American people as a whole of the necessity and efficacy of the war, however, the administration seems more worried about pacifying a small sliver of its base – a very online, very male, and often younger segment of the Maga “new right” that is skeptical about foreign interventionism and especially cynical about anything redolent of the Middle East misadventures of the George W Bush years.
So far that audience seems less than impressed. On X, commenters have responded to the White House war propaganda videos by mocking the videos’ ham-fisted and bloodthirsty aesthetics, describing the US as a cat’s-paw of Israel, or disparaging the Trump administration for betraying the MAGA movement’s promise to put “America first”.
Comments referred to Hegseth as “GI Joke” or suggested that the war with Iran be known as “Operation Epstein Distraction”.
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Israeli soldiers and military vehicles patrol the streets of the city during a raid by Israeli forces in the West Bank city of Al-Bireh on November 28, 2024 [Issam Rimawi/Anadolu Agency]
Israel’s military has warned dozens of its personnel who participated in the ongoing genocide in the Gaza Strip to avoid foreign travel after complaints were filed against them for war crimes.
According to the Israeli outlet, Ynet News, the Israeli military’s warning was given to around 30 soldiers and officers who fought in Gaza and who had then travelled abroad to countries including Cyprus, Slovenia and the Netherlands.
At least eight of those personnel were reportedly ordered to immediately depart from those foreign nations due to apparent fears they could be arrested or questioned, after human rights organisations and pro-Palestinian groups filed complaints against them over their war crimes in Gaza and the Occupied Palestinian Territories.
The cases filed against Israeli leaders and military personnel number in the dozens, with a notable organisation involved in the legal work being the Hind Rajab Foundation – named after the five-year-old Palestinian girl killed by Israeli forces in Gaza back in January this year – which filed a landmark challenge targeting 1,000 Israeli soldiers.
According to the Turkish news outlet, Anadolu Agency, the Foundation’s lawyer, Haroon Raza, told it that the “case includes all types of charges of war crimes specified in the Rome Statute”, explaining that the list includes “the crime of starvation, the crime of attacking civilians, crime of attacking civilian objects, et cetera.”
The case is also reportedly supported by a mass of evidence, with the Foundation’s website stating that “over 8,000 pieces of verifiable evidence – including videos, audio recordings, forensic reports and social media documentation – demonstrates the soldiers’ direct involvement in these atrocities”.
The statement added that all of the soldiers named and identified – largely through their own social media presence and boasts of their exploits – “were located in Gaza during the genocidal assault, and the evidence reveals their participation in violations of international law.”
While the Israeli military does not bar soldiers en masse from travelling abroad as a general policy, it reportedly actively takes a “risk assessment” for troops who served in Gaza before approving their request.
