Who Struck Iran School Killing Over 160 Girls? US And Israel Are Unsure

In Iran, the school week runs from Saturday to Thursday. So classes at a girls' elementary school were underway when US and Israel began bombing Tehran at around 10 am on Saturday. 

Iran says more than 160 people, many of them children, were killed in the strike on Shajareh Tayyebeh school, in Minab, in southern Iran.

State television carried images showing a large crowd of mourners in Minab weeping over what appeared to be bodies wrapped in white shrouds.

The attack came on the first day of US and Israeli attacks on Iran that killed its supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.

Nearly a week into the war, the Top Trump administration officials said on Wednesday that they were still investigating whether it was a US airstrike that hit the school.

Why the school was hit, or which country's forces fired is a mystery or as officials say a subject of investigation. 

Deliberately attacking an educational institution or hospital or any other civilian structure is a war crime under international humanitarian law.

Israel maintains it was not involved in the incident.

Israel's ambassador to the UN, Danny Danon, was also asked about the strike that Iranian state media blamed on Israel and the US. 

Danon said he had seen different reports, including that the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the elite force, targeted the school.

Karoline Leavitt, the White House press secretary, was asked at a briefing Wednesday afternoon if the United States had conducted the airstrike on the school. "Not that we know of," she responded. "The Department of War is investigating this matter."

Pressed to answer if Israel had played a role in the attack, she repeated herself: "Again, the Department of War is currently investigating this matter."

The same question was put to Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth later that day at another press briefing. 

"All I can say is that we're investigating that," Hegseth said.

He then added a disclaimer. 

"We of course never target civilian targets, but we're taking a look and investigating that," he said. 

When a reporter pointed out that several days had passed, and sought clarity, Hegseth's answer did not change.

"We're investigating it," he repeated.

The incident has been condemned by the UN culture and education agency UNESCO and Nobel Peace Prize-winning education activist Malala Yousafzai.