Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said the U.S. is still investigating whether it was an American airstrike that hit an Iranian girls' school on Saturday.
“All I can say is that we’re investigating that, we, of course, never target civilian targets, but we’re taking a look and investigating that,” Hegseth said during a Pentagon news conference on Wednesday.
In a follow-up question about whether there was any clarity about whose munition it was, Hegseth said, “We're investigating it.”
The strike is believed to be one of the deadliest strikes of the U.S.-Israeli war, reportedly killing 175 people, mostly young girls attending classes at the Shajarah Tayyebeh school in the southern city of Minab, according to local health officials.
The school was located next to a naval base belonging to Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps, and the building was once part of the military site, but by 2016 had been walled off from the base and no longer connected, according to The New York Times. Media reports have indicated that at least half of the two-story building was destroyed in an explosion.
U.S. Central Command (CENTCOM) said on Saturday that it was “aware of reports concerning civilian harm” and was “looking into them.”
White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt, asked at a briefing later on Wednesday if the U.S. had conducted the airstrike, said, “Not that we know of,” adding that the Defense Department was “investigating this matter.”
“And I would just tell you that the United States of America does not target civilians, unlike the rogue Iranian regime that targets civilians, that kills children, that has killed thousands of their own people in the past several weeks,” Leavitt said.
She then added that the Iranian regime “uses propaganda quite effectively” and accused “many people” in the White House press corp for “unfortunately” falling for that propaganda.
“So I would caution you from pointing the finger at the United States of America when it comes to targeting civilians because that’s not something that these armed forces do,” Leavitt said.