Questions are mounting in Washington over a deadly airstrike on a primary school in Iran that killed 168 people, most of them children, as senators from President Trump’s opposition demand answers from Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, according to BBC News.
Nearly every Democrat in the U.S. Senate signed a letter pressing Hegseth for details about the strike in the southern Iranian city of Minab. Iranian officials say the bombing killed about 110 children. U.S. media reports suggest that American forces were likely behind the attack, which took place at the start of a joint U.S.-Israeli military operation. However, investigators have yet to finalize their conclusions.
The Pentagon said it would respond directly to the lawmakers who signed the letter, while Hegseth told the BBC that the U.S. “does not target civilians” and is investigating what happened.
Among the signatories was Senator Gary Peters of Michigan, who called the incident “a horrific tragedy.” He said the Senate wanted answers as soon as possible. “Let’s get the facts and then decide what actions to take,” Peters told the BBC.
The letter also questions whether outdated or faulty intelligence may have caused the military to mistake the school for a valid target. It further raises concerns about Hegseth’s previous remarks dismissing what he called “stupid rules of engagement,” asking whether the Pentagon followed international laws designed to prevent war crimes.
If confirmed, the strike could represent one of the deadliest civilian incidents involving U.S. forces in decades of conflict across the Middle East.
No Republicans signed the letter. The only Democrat who declined was Senator John Fetterman, who has supported the war effort but agreed that an investigation was justified.
Video analysis verified by BBC teams shows the school was located beside an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps base that was struck by a Tomahawk missile, a weapon used exclusively by U.S. forces. Analysts said this evidence strongly suggested an American operation, even if the target had been misidentified using old data.
Former CIA Director and retired General David Petraeus told the BBC he believed the U.S. was “probably” responsible, citing the missile type and the age of intelligence data. “It appears the building was once part of an Iranian naval compound,” he said.
President Trump, when asked about the strike, said only, “I just don’t know enough about it,” adding that he would “live with whatever the report shows.”
