Experts Condemn US Strikes on Iran as Potential War Crimes

Over 100 U.S.-based international law experts have signed an open letter condemning recent military strikes on Iran by the United States and Israel as potential war crimes. According to The Guardian, these experts allege that the campaign violates the UN Charter and raises serious concerns about violations of international humanitarian law.

In a national address last week, President Donald Trump warned Iran that if it did not reach an unspecified deal with him, U.S. forces would strike Iranian electric-generating plants and "bring [Iran] back to the stone ages," as reported by The Guardian. The following day, Trump posted images of a strike on the unfinished B1 bridge near Tehran, warning that more attacks were forthcoming.

Erika Guevara Rosas, Amnesty International’s senior director of research and advocacy, stated that intentionally attacking civilian infrastructure like power plants is generally prohibited under international law. She emphasized that such attacks could cause disproportionate harm to civilians and thus be considered unlawful and potentially war crimes. This stance was echoed by the BBC, which reported on the experts' letter highlighting Trump's comments about conducting strikes "just for fun" and Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s statement that the U.S. does not fight with "stupid rules of engagement."

The letter also condemned a strike on a primary school in Minab, Iran, on the first day of the war, which killed at least 168 people, including 110 children. The experts expressed serious concern about strikes that have hit schools, health facilities, and homes, noting that such attacks likely violate international humanitarian law and could amount to war crimes if evidence of recklessness is found.

The White House responded by dismissing the concerns raised by the experts, stating that Trump's actions are making the region safer. The BBC reported that the White House accused Iranian authorities of "maiming and killing Americans" and acting as the primary state sponsor of terror. Meanwhile, Tom Fletcher, the UN's humanitarian chief, told BBC Radio 4 that international law had been "thrown aside," describing the war as reckless.

The experts' letter was published in Just Security, an online journal based at New York University School of Law. According to Al Jazeera, the scholars highlighted four main areas of concern: the legality of the decision to go to war, the conduct of hostilities, threatening rhetoric from senior officials, and what they describe as the dismantling of civilian protection structures inside the U.S. government under Hegseth’s "gloves off" approach to warfare.