US President Donald Trump baselessly claimed over the weekend that Iran was behind the strike on an Iranian elementary school that killed more than 160 people—mostly young girls—during the first wave of US-Israeli bombings, even as evidence mounted that an American missile attack caused the devastation.

A reporter aboard Air Force One asked Trump straightforwardly whether the US bombed “a girls’ elementary school in southern Iran on the first day of the war,” to which the president responded: “No. In my opinion, based on what I’ve seen, that was done by Iran.”

The reporter then asked Pentagon Secretary Pete Hegseth, standing right behind the president, whether the claim was true, and he declined to endorse it, saying, “We’re certainly investigating.”

JUST NOW: “It was done by Iran.”🤔

Despite NYT analysis that a 🇺🇸 bomb killed those Iranian school girls, Trump insists Iran did it. (Hegseth hesitated to agree)

Color us unconvinced.

(H/T @Acyn) pic.twitter.com/jgPkudSm2h
— The Tennessee Holler (@TheTNHoller) March 7, 2026

Michael Waltz, the US ambassador to the United Nations, similarly declined to back Trump’s claim, telling ABC*'*s Martha Raddatz on Sunday that he would “leave that to the investigators to determine.”

“I can tell you, as a veteran, in no uncertain terms, the United States does everything it can to avoid civilian casualties,” Waltz added. “Sometimes, of course, tragic mistakes occur.”

The administration officials’ comments on the massacre, which Human Rights Watch said should be investigated as a possible war crime, came as video footage, satellite images, and other evidence further indicated it was likely US forces who carried out the February 28 attack on the Iranian school in Minab. Reuters reported last week that, contrary to Trump’s claim, US military investigators believe American forces were likely behind the school bombing.

“I guess acknowledging that you attacked a school and killed a bunch of children right off the bat might spoil POTUS’s splendid little war,” Brian Finucane, a former US State Department lawyer, wrote on social media.

The new video footage, which shows a Tomahawk missile hitting an Iranian military facility near the school, was released by the Iranian outlet Mehr News and analyzed by Bellingcat.

“The US is the only participant in the war that is known to have Tomahawk missiles,” Bellingcat noted. “Israel is not known to have Tomahawk missiles.”

New video footage shows a US Tomahawk missile hitting an IRGC facility in Minab, Iran, on Feb 28, showing for the first time that the US struck the area. The footage also shows smoke already rising from the vicinity of the girls’ school, where 175 people were reportedly killed. pic.twitter.com/4jBXrNcRJO
— Trevor Ball (@Easybakeovensz) March 8, 2026

The New York Times, which independently verified the video, observed that “as the camera pans to the right, large plumes of dust and smoke are already billowing from the area around the elementary school, suggesting that it had been struck shortly before the strike on the naval base.”

“This is supported by a timeline of the strikes assembled by the Times that shows the school was hit around the time as the base,” the newspaper added. “The Times has identified the weapon seen in the new video as a Tomahawk cruise missile, a weapon that neither the Israeli military nor the Iranian military has. Dozens of Tomahawks have been launched by US Navy warships into Iran since February 28, when the US-Israeli attack on Iran began.”

A group of six Democratic US senators said in a joint statement late Sunday that they are “horrified” by the latest reports on the school strike, noting that “independent analysis credibly suggests the strike may have been conducted by US forces, which if true, would make it one of the worst cases of civilian casualties in decades of American military action in the Middle East.”

“The killing of school children is appalling and unacceptable under any circumstance,” said Sens. Brian Schatz of Hawaii, Patty Murray of Washington, Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire, Jack Reed of Rhode Island, Mark Warner of Virginia, and Chris Coons of Delaware. “This incident is particularly concerning in light of Secretary Hegseth’s openly cavalier approach to the use of force, including his statement that US strikes in Iran wouldn’t be bound by ‘stupid rules of engagement,’ in his words.”

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