175 Children Are Dead. Trump Blamed Iran. The Missile Was American.

"I Just Don't Know Enough About It." Then Why Did You Blame Iran, Mr. President?

Let me ask you a question. If someone told you they “just don’t know enough” about a situation, would you trust them to tell you who was responsible for it? Would you take their word when they pointed the finger at someone else? Of course you wouldn’t. And here is exactly why that matters right now.

On February 28, 2026, the first day of U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran, a Tomahawk cruise missile destroyed the Shajareh Tayyebeh elementary school in Minab, a city in the southern Iranian province of Hormozgan. At least 168 to 180 people died. Most of them were young girls between the ages of seven and twelve. They were in class when the missile hit. Their parents could not reach the school in time to pick them up.

I have been a trial lawyer for four decades. I have spent my career sorting fact from fiction, holding powerful people accountable, and protecting families when the system fails them. I know what evidence looks like. I know what a cover up smells like. And what is happening right now with the Trump administration’s response to this tragedy should alarm every single American, regardless of political affiliation.

What the President Said

On March 7, a full week after the strike, President Trump finally addressed the school bombing. A reporter aboard Air Force One asked whether the United States was responsible. Trump’s answer was clear and specific. “No, in my opinion, based on what I’ve seen, that was done by Iran.” He continued, “We think it was done by Iran, because they are very inaccurate, as you know, with their munitions. They have no accuracy whatsoever. It was done by Iran.”

Think about what he did there. He did not say he wasn’t sure. He did not say the matter was under investigation. He pointed directly at Iran and said Iran bombed its own school full of its own children. He stated it three times in a single answer. That was a deliberate choice.

Then came March 9. At a press conference at Trump National Doral in Miami, a reporter confronted him with the mounting evidence, including video footage showing a Tomahawk missile striking the area near the school. The reporter said, “Mr. President, you just suggested that Iran somehow got its hands on a Tomahawk and bombed its own elementary school on the first day of the war. You’re the only person in your government saying this. Even your defense secretary wouldn’t say that. Why are you the only person saying this?”

Trump’s response was staggering. “Because I just don’t know enough about it.”

Read that again. On Saturday, he knew enough to blame Iran three times in a single answer. By Monday, he suddenly didn’t know enough about it to have an opinion at all. So which is it? Did he know, or didn’t he? And if he didn’t know, why did he confidently blame a foreign nation for murdering its own schoolchildren?

Watch here:

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What the Evidence Actually Shows

Every major news organization and investigative group has now examined the facts. The New York Times, CNN, NBC News, NPR, the Washington Post, ABC News, the BBC, Bellingcat, and multiple arms experts have all reached the same conclusion. The United States was likely responsible for the strike on the Shajareh Tayyebeh school.

A preliminary U.S. military investigation, reported by Reuters and confirmed by multiple officials, reached the same finding. According to people briefed on the inquiry, the school was formerly part of an Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps naval base compound. At some point between 2013 and 2016, it was physically separated from the base. Fences went up. Watchtowers came down. Public entrances were opened. Play areas and a sports field were painted on the asphalt. The walls were painted blue and pink. It was a school. Anyone looking at satellite imagery could see that.

The problem was that the Defense Intelligence Agency provided Central Command with outdated targeting data that still classified the school building as a military structure. Officers at Central Command used those old coordinates to program the strike. The school was hit during school hours on a Saturday, which is a working day in Iran. Somewhere between 264 students were present according to the Iranian Ministry of Education. Most of them were girls between seven and twelve years old.

Video footage released by Iran’s semiofficial Mehr News Agency, geolocated by Bellingcat and verified by CNN, NPR, and other outlets, shows a Tomahawk cruise missile striking the IRGC naval base adjacent to the school on February 28. In the footage, smoke is already rising from the area where the school stood. Missile fragments recovered from the site include a satellite antenna marked “SDL ANTENNA” made by Ball Aerospace, supplied to the U.S. military in 2014. Additional fragments bore markings that read “Made in USA” and included a Department of Defense contract number. CNN analysts, Bellingcat researchers, and multiple independent munitions experts all confirmed the debris is consistent with an American Tomahawk cruise missile.

The Tomahawk Truth

Here is the fact that blows a hole through every excuse the administration has floated. Tomahawk cruise missiles are manufactured by Raytheon, an American defense contractor. They are long range, precision guided weapons designed to strike targets from over 1,000 miles away. They are not “generic,” as Trump claimed. They are not widely available, as Trump implied. And Iran absolutely does not have them, despite what Trump told reporters.

Only a handful of countries on earth possess Tomahawk missiles. Here is the complete list. The United States. The United Kingdom. Australia. Japan is in the process of acquiring them. The Netherlands has also agreed to purchase them. That is it. Five countries, and two of those are still in the acquisition phase.

Notice who is missing from that list. Iran. Israel. Every other nation involved in this conflict.

The U.S. government actually rejected Israel’s request to purchase Tomahawk missiles back in 1998 because the sale would have violated Missile Technology Control Regime guidelines. Israel does not have them. Iran has never had them. Iran has its own domestically produced cruise missiles, and according to multiple weapons experts, those missiles look nothing like a Tomahawk.

So when Trump told reporters that Iran “also has some Tomahawks,” that statement was false. PolitiFact rated it false. Arms experts from the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the Middlebury Institute, Armament Research Services, and Bellingcat all confirmed it. Iran does not have Tomahawk missiles. Period. The United States is the only combatant in this war known to possess and deploy them. The chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Dan Caine, confirmed during a March 4 press conference that the initial U.S. strikes focused on southern Iran, exactly where the school was located. The Department of Defense published photos and video of the USS Spruance, an Arleigh Burke class guided missile destroyer, firing a Tomahawk on the very day the school was hit.

The math here is not complicated. The only military force in this war that fires Tomahawk missiles is the United States. A Tomahawk missile hit the area around the school. Tomahawk fragments with American markings were recovered from the site. The U.S. military’s own preliminary investigation points to a targeting mistake using outdated intelligence data. And yet the President of the United States told you Iran did this to its own children.

Why This Matters to You

If you are reading this and thinking, “Mistakes happen in war,” I hear you. They do. And there are historical examples of how to handle them with honesty and accountability. When U.S. planes accidentally bombed the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade in 1999 during the war in Serbia, President Clinton called the Chinese president to apologize and made clear it was an isolated error. When civilians were killed in Afghanistan, American forces went to the families, acknowledged the mistake, and offered compensation. That is what responsible leaders do.

What Trump is doing is the opposite. He is not acknowledging the mistake. He is not taking responsibility. He first blamed Iran for bombing its own school. Then he suggested the Tomahawk is some kind of generic weapon sold everywhere. Then he claimed Iran has Tomahawks. Then he said he doesn’t know enough about the situation. Each claim contradicted the last. Each claim was designed to move the conversation away from a dead simple truth. The United States killed these children.

This is not a partisan observation. Republican Senator Kevin Cramer of North Dakota said the U.S. “ought to get to the bottom of it for sure. And admit if we know whose fault it is.” Former CIA and Pentagon chief Leon Panetta said the administration should tell the truth because “if you just simply lie about some mistakes that are being made, that will come back to undermine your leadership.” Even Trump’s own Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth refused to back up the President’s claim that Iran was responsible. When a reporter asked if Trump’s statement was accurate, Hegseth said, “We’re certainly investigating.” He would not say yes.

A U.S. government official who reviewed satellite imagery of the school was more blunt. This official told The Intercept, “This is another instance of Trump lying and just talking out of his ass. This clearly was not a failed rocket from the IRGC base.”

The Bigger Picture

This school bombing does not exist in a vacuum. It exists within a pattern. Trump started this war. His administration launched Operation Epic Fury on February 28, 2026. And from the very first day, the administration has shown it is more concerned with controlling the narrative than telling the truth.

Defense Secretary Hegseth said on March 2 that the U.S. was running its air campaign with “no stupid rules of engagement” and “no politically correct wars.” Think about what that means in the context of a school full of children reduced to rubble.

The administration signaled from day one that it would prioritize speed and aggression over the kind of careful targeting procedures designed to protect civilians. And now 175 people, most of them little girls, are dead because someone at the Defense Intelligence Agency failed to update a targeting file, and nobody along the chain double checked whether a building with blue and pink painted walls and a sports field painted on the asphalt was still a military target.

I want you to hold this reality in your mind the next time you hear anyone from this administration tell you anything about this war. Anything about civilian casualties. Anything about why we’re there. Anything about what’s happening on the ground. They lied to your face about a school full of dead children. They saw the evidence, and they blamed the victims’ own government. If they will lie about this, they will lie about anything.

What You Can Do Right Now

You do not have to sit on the sidelines. You have a voice. You have a vote. And you have a responsibility to demand the truth from the people who serve you.

Call your members of Congress. Tell them you want a full, transparent, and public accounting of the Minab school strike and the Iran war in general. Tell them you want accountability for the targeting failure and for the dishonest statements that followed. Share this article. Talk about it at dinner. Talk about it at work. Make sure the people around you know what happened, because Trump and his administration are counting on you to move on and forget.

175 people, most of them children, are dead. This president blamed Iran for bombing its own school. The evidence shows it was an American missile, built by an American company, launched from an American warship, programmed with American targeting data. And the President of the United States looked at the cameras and told you someone else did it.

We cannot let that stand. Not as Americans. Not as parents. Not as human beings who still believe accountability and truth matter. Our kids and grandkids are counting on us to get this right.

The facts are on the table. The question is what you are going to do about them.

Mitch Jackson, Esq.

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