A new joint report by Human Rights Activists in Iran (HRA), Center for Civilians in Conflict (CIVIC), and Airwars reveals the scale and intensity of the U.S. and Israel’s first month of strikes on Iran.
Between February 28th and March 23rd, the report finds that:
- At least 1,443 civilians have been killed by U.S. and Israeli forces, including 217 children, according to HRA. This is a minimum with the toll expected to rise as additional information surfaces.
- Airwars identified a minimum of 130 distinct incidents where civilians were reported killed or injured. These include strikes on healthcare, education facilities, and residential areas. HRA has verified damage to 60 hospitals or medical centres, 44 schools, 129 residential buildings.
- In the deadliest day so far recorded by HRA, at least 252 civilians were killed on March 9 in a barrage of almost 400 strikes across the country, reflecting a high tempo of operations. That number is almost as many civilians as Airwars recorded killed in the entirety of last year’s 52-day U.S. operation on Yemen – at the time, a campaign of unprecedented harm.
- Drivers of civilian harm from U.S. and Israeli operations identified by CIVIC, HRA, and Airwars include targeting errors and misidentification, including as a result of outdated or faulty intelligence; inadequate precautionary warnings for civilians; the use of explosive weapons in densely populated areas; and attacks on or impacting civilian and “dual-use” infrastructure, risking long-term reverberating impacts on civilians’ well-being.
- The campaign has involved the use of some of the largest munitions in the conventional US military arsenal – the MK80 series, which includes 2000lb bombs, as well as JASSM and Tomahawk missiles, which can each hit targets hundreds of miles away with large ‘bunker-buster’ warheads.
- Iranian civilians have faced intensified domestic repression alongside being subject to U.S. and Israeli bombardment, including expanded arbitrary arrests (HRA identifies at least 1,830 arrests as of March 19), as well as restrictive security controls further constraining the ability to seek safety or access information.
Read the full report in English and in Farsi
