TEHRAN — They came for the children first. Then they came for the hospitals, the cultural treasures, the residential neighborhoods, and also—in an act of such breathtaking illegality that it has stunned even seasoned observers—they came for the nation's leader himself.
The martyrdom of Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei in a targeted airstrike on his Tehran residence has stripped away whatever pretense remained that "Operation Epic Fury" is a legitimate military campaign.
This is not warfare. It is slaughter masquerading as strategy—a campaign of state terror without limit or law. The U.S. and Israel have murdered over 1230 so far, and the world has had enough.
The massacre of innocence
The Shajareh Tayyebeh elementary school in Minab, Hormozgan province, was struck on the morning of February 28, the first day of the bombing campaign.
The strike was remarkably precise. The building, which satellite imagery confirms had been walled off from any adjacent military infrastructure since 2016, was hit with such force that concrete roofs collapsed onto classrooms where girls aged seven to twelve were studying.
168 of them did not survive. At least 95 more were wounded, many grievously.
Even a New York Times visual investigation concluded that the school "was severely damaged by a precision strike that occurred at the same time as attacks on an adjacent naval base."
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