Preliminary findings have determined that the United States is responsible for the Tomahawk strike on the Iranian girls' school in Minab, where over 175 people were killed, The New York Times reported on Wednesday, citing US officials and others familiar with the findings.
According to the NYT, the ongoing investigation found that US Central Command (CENTCOM) had been using outdated information to create target coordinates for the strikes.
The data, which had been provided by the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), labeled the school building as a military target, according to the officials.
The building had originally been a part of the adjacent Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) naval base, though officials told the NYT that it isn’t clear when the two had separated.
They further noted that there are still “important unanswered questions about why the outdated information had not been double checked.”
NYT says that the US accidentally struck girls' school in Iran
Officials are also reportedly looking into whether AI or any of the systems the military uses to gather intelligence could have made the mistake, though it has been ruled as unlikely at the time.
According to an independent investigation by the NYT, the school building had been fenced off from the base between 2013 and 2016. Military watchtowers near the building had been removed, the NYT added, and three public entrances had been opened since.
CENTCOM declined the NYT’s request for comment, and the DIA referred the question to the Pentagon, which also declined to comment, citing the ongoing investigation.
The NYT originally reported similar findings on Sunday, citing a newly published video by Iran’s semi-official Mehr News Agency that it had later independently verified showing a Tomahawk cruise missile striking the base.
It had further noted that the US military is the only force operating in the current conflict against the Islamic regime that possesses Tomahawk missiles, which would rule out an Israeli attack or an Iranian misfire.
The NYT also said that US Central Command said that one of the videos it had published of several Tomahawks being launched from Navy ships was filmed on February 28, the same day the base and the school were hit.
Trump denies US ties to strike
The NYT asked US President Donald Trump about the incident on Saturday, to which the president replied that the US was not responsible.
He added that, in his opinion and based on what he has seen, the strike was "done by Iran. They're very inaccurate, as you know, with their munitions."
US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said on Wednesday that the US was investigating the strike, adding that "we, of course, never target civilian targets. But we’re taking a look and investigating that."
Chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Dan Caine said in a Wednesday conference that the US was carrying out strikes in southern Iran at the time the hit occured.
At the time, Caine showed a map that included a strike on the area where Minab is located, near the Strait of Hormuz.
Caine also acknowledged to reporters at the Pentagon last Monday that the US Navy has used Tomahawks during its strikes on southern Iran.
James Genn contributed to this report.