On September 17, 2026, the Independent International Fact-Finding Mission on the Islamic Republic of Iran, a body created by the UN Human Rights Council, released a report finding “reasonable grounds to believe” that the United States committed war crimes in two strikes on the first day of the war with Iran. The same report found that Iran's government committed crimes against humanity in its crackdown on protesters. “Reasonable grounds to believe” is the standard UN investigative bodies use; the report is not a court ruling and is not binding.
The first strike hit the Shajareh Tayyebeh Primary School in Minab on February 28, a school the report describes as “for girls and boys aged 6 to 13.” The mission cited the local prosecutor's final toll of 156 killed, including 120 schoolchildren (73 boys and 47 girls), 26 educators and seven parents; other credible information put the toll at 157. It found the building was clearly identifiable as a school, walled off from a nearby Revolutionary Guard naval complex, and concluded that “the building of the school was the intended point of impact and that the damage did not result from an errant strike or collateral damage.” It identified the weapon as a Tomahawk cruise missile and noted “the U.S. is the only party to the conflict that possesses Tomahawk missiles.”
On intent, the mission found that the U.S. failure to update its targeting data and verify the building “went beyond mere negligence,” and that the U.S. acted recklessly. As part of the basis for that finding, it cited “the U.S. Government's deprioritisation of civilian harm mitigation and of compliance with IHL; expressed through public statements by senior U.S. leadership, including the President and the Secretary of Defense.” It concluded there were “reasonable grounds to believe that the U.S. committed the war crime of launching an indiscriminate attack resulting in loss of life or injury to civilians or damage to civilian objects.”
The second strike, at about 5:10 p.m. the same day, hit a sports center in Lamerd, where a local official said 22 people were killed. The mission found reasonable grounds to believe the weapon was the U.S. Precision Strike Missile, which bursts above its target and scatters tungsten pellets, and that the U.S., “by choosing to use the PrSM missile in a populated civilian area,” launched an attack “reckless as to the likely extent of death or injury.”
The mission said it wrote to the U.S. government on June 16 and twice on June 24 seeking information and meetings, and received no response. It also reported that “Key satellite image providers have restricted access to imagery from the armed conflict in response to concerns set forth by the U.S.” AP reported that the administration “has yet to directly accept responsibility or release the findings of a Pentagon investigation”; the report cites news reports that a preliminary Defense Department inquiry found U.S. responsibility, and says CENTCOM commander Brad Cooper said in May its findings “correlated” the Minab strike with a U.S. strike. The State Department and the U.S. mission in Geneva did not immediately respond to AP and Reuters. The report was expected to be presented to the Human Rights Council the following week.
On Iran, the mission found that “gross human rights violations by Iran amount to the crimes against humanity of murder, imprisonment and other severe deprivation of physical liberty, torture, and other inhumane acts.” Reuters corrected an early version of its story to remove a claim, not found in the report, that the U.S. relied on intelligence placing a senior Iranian commander at the school (see Trump Denies Bombing an Iranian Elementary School Where More Than 150 People Were Killed, Calling Reports 'Fake News' Despite Satellite Evidence, An Untested PrSM Missile Was Used Near a School in Lamerd, Killing 21 People in What the Pentagon Called a 'Precision Strike' and The Pentagon Dismantled 90% of Its Civilian Protection Program Before the Iran War and Fired the Military Lawyers Who Provided Legal Guidance).