SPECIAL REPORT: By Brett Wilkins of Common Dreams

US and Israeli airstrikes have killed nearly 300 Iranian and Lebanese children over the past nine days as the attackers target apartment towers, single-family homes, schools, medical facilities, and other civilian infrastructure.

Iran’s Health Ministry said Sunday that 198 women and 190 minors have been killed by US and Israeli attacks since February 28, including six children under the age of 5. The youngest reported victim is an 8-month-old girl.

Children account for more than 30 percent of those killed, according to the ministry, which also said that 1044 women and 638 children have been injured.

Overall, Iran said that more than 1300 people have been killed by the airstrikes, which are reportedly targeting 30 of the country’s 31 provinces.

The Lebanese Health Ministry announced Sunday that 394 people, including 42 women and 83 children, have been killed by Israel Defence Forces (IDF) attacks after Iran-backed Hezbollah joined the war.

The US-based charity Save the Children noted yesterday that the number of slain Iranian and Lebanese minors is the equivalent of “10 classrooms full of children”.

“It is devastating that airstrikes in Lebanon have reportedly caused the deaths of 83 children… among nearly 300 children killed in the region,” said Save the Children Lebanon director Nora Ingdal.

‘Not just numbers’
“These are not just numbers — these are young lives cut short and children whose futures have been forever scarred by war.”

Israel claims it has killed around 200 Hezbollah fighters. However, the IDF’s routine attacks on apartment towers and other residential buildings have drawn widespread condemnation.

On Sunday, an IDF strike massacred 18 people sheltering in an apartment building in Sir El-Gharbiyeh in Nabatieh district. The building was housing some of the nearly 700,000 Lebanese forcibly displaced by Israeli attacks, including around 200,000 children.

Local officials said women and children were among the victims.

Another IDF aerial massacre in the southern Lebanese town of Tafahata killed eight people, including five members of the Ezzedine family, whose home was bombed.

“This time is much worse than the previous war,” Nabatieh Civil Defence chief Hussein Faqih told the National, referring to Israel’s 2023-25 attacks on Lebanon that killed more than 4000 people, including nearly 800 women and over 300 children, in retaliation for Hezbollah’s rocket strikes in solidarity with Palestine during the Gaza genocide.

Israeli attacks on Iran during last year’s 12-Day War also killed more than 1000 Iranians, including 436 civilians.

Worst reported bombing
In the worst reported bombing of the current war — and possibly the deadliest US massacre since more than 400 Iraqis were wiped out in a “precision strike” on a Baghdad bomb shelter during the 1991 Gulf War — around 175 Iranians, most of them young children, were killed in what first responders and victims’ relatives said was a so-called double-tap strike on an elementary school in Minab in southern Iran.

US military investigators reportedly believe the strike was carried out by US forces, but President Donald Trump has blamed Iran.

On Monday, a group of Democratic US senators lead by Jeanne Shaheen of New Hampshire said they were “horrified” by the school strike.

“The killing of school children is appalling and unacceptable under any circumstance,” the senators said in a statement. “This incident is particularly concerning in light of [Defence Secretary Pete] 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.”

Multiple members of the UK Parliament have condemned the killing of Iranian and Lebanese children.

Leftist Independent Jeremy Corbyn, a former Labour leader, said yesterday on Bluesky: “Classrooms of children in Iran. Hundreds of people in Lebanon. The ongoing genocide in Gaza. The message from our political and media class is clear: Their lives are less valuable than others.”

“Every human being matters, and every human being deserves a life of peace,” Corbyn added.

‘School girls slaughtered’
Zahra Sultana, who quit Labour and started the socialist Your Party with Corbyn last year, mocked US and Israeli pretensions, saying in a BBC interview on Sunday — International Women’s Day — that the girls in the Minab school were slaughtered “apparently to liberate women”.

Retaliatory attacks by Iran have killed at least 13 Israelis and wounded nearly 2000 others since February 28, according to Israel’s government. No Israeli child deaths have been reported. Seven US troops and at least 15 people in Gulf Arab nations have also been killed by Iranian counterattacks.

While the world’s focus is on Iran, Israeli occupation forces have continued killing and wounding people in Gaza and the West Bank of Palestine.

Drop Site News reported yesterday that eight Palestinians were killed in Gaza over the past 24 hours, including two women and at least as many children.

More than 250,000 Palestinians have been killed or wounded by Israeli forces since the Hamas-led attack of October 7, 2023. More than 20,000 children have been killed and over 44,000 others wounded.

More than 1 in 4 fatalities have been children in a war for which Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is wanted by the International Criminal Court for alleged crimes against humanity and war crimes, and Israel is facing a genocide case currently before the International Court of Justice.

Since the 9/11 attacks, US-led wars have left nearly 1 million people dead in more than half a dozen countries in the Middle East, South Asia, and Africa—over 400,000 of them civilians, according to the Costs of War Project at Brown University’s Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs.

“Every war is a war on children, and once again we are seeing them pay the highest price for a conflict they neither started nor had a say in,” Ingdal said yesterday.

“Wars have laws, and children must be off limits in every conflict,” she added. “World leaders must act urgently to prevent further escalation. There must be an immediate cessation of hostilities, and all parties must uphold international humanitarian law and do everything in their power to protect civilians—especially children.”

Republished under Creative Commons.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Tens of thousands of ni-Vanuatu children could be experiencing “stress and trauma” after the double cyclones that tore through the island nation last week, say educators.

With widespread damages to infrastructure, many children have lost their homes, had their schools damaged, and neighbourhoods hit hard by tropical cyclones Judy and Kevin.

Port Vila International School teacher Cassidy Jackson-Caroll told RNZ Pacific it was important to prioritise school-aged children’s wellbeing during these times.

Jackson-Caroll said that requires all stakeholders to move quickly and restore a sense of normalcy and enable children to return to school.

“It is quite important [for schools to open],” she said, while noting the large-scale devastation caused by the twin cyclones.

“One thing I thought is the kids want to see their friends. They have spent a lot of time time at home tucked up with their families, which is very important [during cyclones]. But they also need a little relief to see that their friends are okay.”

She said no electricity and no running water is an issue across the country which means schools remain affected.

But she is hoping the situation will improve by next week and those children who can return to school will be able do so.

“I think it is important even if it is half days or two or three days a week for some kids that is enough because some are going to be traumatiSed,” she said, adding Port Vila International School will have a “soft opening” on Wednesday.

“Sometimes they might just need to see their friends and go and play some soccer or just have a hug. They just need to laugh away from the anxiety and stress and trauma that they might have at home,” she added.

Schools, health centres ‘damaged’
UNICEF estimates up to 58,000 children have been impacted and those in the worst affected provinces of Tafea and Shefa needing urgent assistance.

The UN agency’s Pacific representative Jonathan Veitch said “with power still out in many places, and boats and planes grounded or damaged, we still don’t have enough information on the impact of children in the outer islands of Tafea.”

“We know that schools and health centres have been damaged throughout the country.”

“UNICEF Pacific, in partnership with the government, has begun to support the children and families most affected,” he added.

Preliminary reports indicate that almost the entire population has been affected.

World Vision Vanuatu country director Kendra Derouseau said they are expecting similar destruction to Tafea province that occured following Cyclone Pam in 2015.

“We know that most homes will be partly or completely destroyed,” Derouseau said.

Food sources scarce
“The vast majority of the population in Tafea are subsistence agricultural farmers so food sources will be scarce and water sources will be contaminated.”

She confirmed that there were about 2000 people still in evacuation centres on Efate.

“People tend to sleep in the evacuation centres, leave vulnerable individuals and a carer in the centres during the day, and then go back to their homes to try and build and repair and then come back to sleep at night.”

But Derouseau said the number of people in evacuation centres were decreasing as people felt safe to go back to their home.

Meanwhile, New Zealand has sent relief supplies including water containers, kits for temporary shelters, and family hygiene kits and an initial financial contribution of NZ$150,000.

Foreign Affairs Minister Nanaia Mahuta said the government was working closely with Vanuatu to support this response, together with France and Australia.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz