'Children Of Heaven&#8217 80 Killed In US-Israeli Strike On Iranian School

(MENAFN- Kashmir Observer) By Rubab Fatima

Tehran – The morning bell had barely faded when the sky over southern Iran tore open.

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In the coastal city of Minab, children sat in their classrooms at the girls' elementary school Shajareh Tayyebeh, their notebooks open, their futures unwritten. Minutes later, according to Iranian officials, those same classrooms were reduced to rubble in a coordinated US–Israeli airstrike ordered as part of a widening offensive spearheaded by US President Donald Trump.

By nightfall, state media in Iran reported at least 80 young students dead and dozens more critically wounded, the first confirmed civilian fatalities inside the country since Israel and the United States launched attacks in the morning. Earlier official tallies fluctuated: a provincial deputy governor initially reported five deaths; the governor of Minab later revised the toll to 51 killed and 60 injured. Rescue teams continued pulling children from the debris late into the day, warning that the numbers could rise further.

The strike hit during school hours in Hormozgan Province, near the shores of the Persian Gulf. Approximately 170 students were believed to be inside the building when it was struck. Field reports indicate that minutes after the initial blast, a nearby clinic treating the wounded was also damaged in a subsequent attack, compounding panic and chaos.

Washington and Tel Aviv have described their broader campaign as a strategic operation aimed at dismantling Tehran's military capabilities and nuclear programme. But images circulating from Minab – collapsed concrete slabs, scorched backpacks, and bloodstained desks – have ignited fury across Iran and intensified accusations that the offensive has crossed a catastrophic moral line.

In a separate statement, Iran's Foreign Ministry spokesperson labelled the joint US–Israeli actions“aggressive and unjustified”, arguing that the targeting of Iranian cities, including the school in Minab, constituted“a blatant crime”. The spokesperson urged the United Nations Security Council to act immediately under its responsibilities in the UN Charter, warning that silence would embolden further escalation.

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Iranian officials condemned the US-Israeli strike as“an attack against civilians”, saying it occurred even as diplomatic contacts were ongoing. The country's foreign minister, Abbas Araghchi, posted on X that“dozens of innocent children have been murdered at this site alone”, calling the attack a crime that“will not go unanswered”.

The assault on Minab came amid an unprecedented wave of coordinated strikes across Iranian territory. President Trump described the operation as a major combat offensive to neutralise perceived threats posed by Tehran. Iranian leaders, however, have framed it as an imposed war, one that has now claimed the lives of primary school children.

Tehran responded swiftly, launching ballistic missiles and drones toward Israeli territory and US military installations across the Gulf, including bases in Bahrain, Qatar, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. Air defence systems were activated across Israel as sirens wailed in major cities. There were no immediate independent confirmations of casualty figures from the exchanges.

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Yet beyond the military objectives and retaliatory vows, the shattered desks of the Minab school have come to define the day. In a conflict now openly led by Washington and Tel Aviv, the war's first confirmed civilian dead inside Iran were not soldiers or officials - they were schoolchildren.

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