[00:00] Announcer: This is Neural Newscast for Thursday, March 26th, 2026.
[00:05] Announcer: We are following breaking news from the Middle East.
[00:08] Announcer: I'm Elise Morrow.
[00:10] Evelyn Hartwell: And I'm Evelyn Hartwell.
[00:12] Evelyn Hartwell: Our United States-made Tomahawk cruise missile has struck an elementary school in Mina, Iran.
[00:18] Evelyn Hartwell: This is emerging as one of the deadliest civilian casualty incidents of the current conflict.
[00:24] Evelyn Hartwell: Local officials report at least 175 people were killed at the Shajaree Tayeb Elementary School.
[00:31] Evelyn Hartwell: More than 150 of the victims were girls between the ages of 7 and 12.
[00:37] Announcer: The details regarding the targeting of this facility are particularly troubling.
[00:41] Announcer: The school was a converted site.
[00:43] Announcer: It had previously served as an Iranian Revolutionary Guard facility
[00:47] Announcer: before being transitioned to civilian use for primary education several years ago.
[00:53] Announcer: Video analysis released after the attack confirms a Tomahawk missile struck the compound directly.
[00:59] Announcer: This is a weapon used exclusively by United States forces in this region.
[01:04] Evelyn Hartwell: The Pentagon has now opened a formal investigation into the strike.
[01:09] Evelyn Hartwell: Preliminary findings point to the use of outdated intelligence as the primary cause for the error.
[01:15] Evelyn Hartwell: However, military analysts suggest this failure was a predictable outcome of recent structural changes within the Department of Defense.
[01:24] Evelyn Hartwell: Specifically, they point to the dismantling of the Civilian Harm Mitigation and Response Program.
[01:31] Announcer: That program was designed to embed specialized analysts with combatant commands.
[01:37] Announcer: Their job was to verify targeting data and maintain no-strike lists of schools, hospitals, and other protected sites.
[01:46] Announcer: On March 2, War Secretary Pete Hegseth characterized these rules of engagement as stupid and politically correct.
[01:55] Announcer: Since those remarks, the infrastructure designed to prevent these exact tragedies has been systematically hollowed out.
[02:04] Evelyn Hartwell: New reporting from NPR and ProPublica indicates that the teams created to prevent civilian casualties have been reduced by approximately 90% over the past year.
[02:14] Evelyn Hartwell: At United States Central Command, which is responsible for the campaign in Iran,
[02:19] Evelyn Hartwell: there is reportedly only a single staff member remaining to assess civilian casualty mitigation.
[02:25] Evelyn Hartwell: This reduction in oversight means critical updates to the civilian environment are not reaching commanders in the field.
[02:31] Announcer: The incident raises serious questions about the current definition of military discipline.
[02:37] Announcer: When safeguards are treated as optional or as bureaucratic obstacles, the risk of catastrophic targeting failures rises.
[02:45] Announcer: The strike in Minab demonstrates that lethality without rigorous verification
[02:51] Announcer: leads to the destruction of protected spaces like schools and homes.
[02:56] Announcer: The investigation must now determine who allowed this outdated data to remain active in the system.
[03:03] Evelyn Hartwell: The broader concern among special operations veterans is that this signals a drift
[03:10] Evelyn Hartwell: where restraint is viewed as a weakness.
[03:14] Evelyn Hartwell: As the formal investigation continues, the focus remains on whether there will be accountability,
[03:21] Evelyn Hartwell: specifically for those who dismantled the offices designed to catch these errors
[03:27] Evelyn Hartwell: before they resulted in the loss of 150 children.
[03:32] Evelyn Hartwell: And I'm Evelyn Hartwell.
[03:35] Evelyn Hartwell: Neural Newscast is AI-assisted, human-reviewed.
[03:40] Evelyn Hartwell: View our AI Transparency Policy at NeuralNewscast.com