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Since 2020, Zionist colonisers have killed over 1,100 Palestinians in the West Bank.
In that period, how many have been prosecuted?

Not one.

Not one arrest. Not one trial. Not one conviction.
And now the same Knesset that allowed that impunity has just passed a law to hang Palestinians.

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In 1956 an event took place that didn’t just humiliate two of the world’s greatest empires. It fundamentally shifted the balance of global power forever.

It involved a conspiracy between three nations. A secret meeting in a French villa. A staged military operation.

And almost nobody talks about what really happened. Or why it matters more today than ever before.

Is history repeating itself with the American zionist Iran war? And if it is, what does that tell us about how this war ends?

That’s what we cover today on Political Alchemy.

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We examine new statements coming from Washington, the controversial apology issued by Iran’s president, and the growing tensions across the region as the conflict widens.

We also look at reports surrounding the deadly strike on an Iranian school that killed over 170 people, mostly girls, and the conflicting narratives emerging from Western media and officials.

Day 10

We are joined by journalist Usman A. Khan to discuss the appointment of Mojtaba Khamenei as Iran’s new Supreme Leader and what this leadership transition means for the political landscape in Iran.

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On Saturday, 28 February 2026, a girls' primary school in Minab, a city in Iran's southern Hormozgan province, was struck during the first wave of US-Israeli airstrikes on Iran. The Shajareh Tayyebeh elementary school was full of pupils aged 7 to 12. Iranian authorities reported at least 168 people killed, the majority of them children. Neither the United States nor Israel claimed responsibility. On 7 March 2026, President Trump told reporters aboard Air Force One that, in his view, Iran was responsible for the strike on its own school.

Donald Trump said, without citing evidence, that he believes the strike was “done by Iran” because “they’re very inaccurate with their munitions.” CBS News Hegseth flanked him, saying the Pentagon was “investigating” while claiming “the only side that targets civilians is Iran.”

Key Fact #1: The Pentagon Contradicts Trump

Reuters, citing two unnamed US officials, reported that US military investigators believe it is “likely” that American forces were responsible for the strike on the Shajareh Tayyebeh girls’ school in Minab. Yahoo!

Source: Reuters exclusive, March 5, 2026

Key Fact #2: The NYT Visual Investigation Points to the US

The New York Times concluded that US forces were “most likely to have carried out the strike,” given that American forces were simultaneously bombarding an adjacent IRGC naval base. The Times also rejected the claim that an Iranian missile hit the elementary school. Common Dreams

Wes J. Bryant, a former US Air Force targeting expert, reviewed the imagery and concluded the buildings, including the school, were hit with “picture-perfect” target strikes, Common Dreams

Source: New York Times, March 5, 2026

Key Fact #3: The Strike Was Precision, Not “Inaccurate” Directly Contradicting Trump’s Framing

Experts speaking to NPR corroborated the airstrike’s precision. Researchers at Oregon State University’s Conflict Ecology Laboratory noted the detonation centroids were “pretty clean.” Satellite imagery specialist Jeffrey Lewis agreed the airstrikes were precision strikes. Wikipedia

This destroys Trump’s specific claim - that Iran was responsible because it is “inaccurate with munitions.” The evidence shows the opposite: these were precision-guided munitions, consistent with US/Israeli capabilities, not an errant Iranian missile.

Key Fact #4: Geographic Logic Rules Out Iran, Points to the US

According to satellite imagery analysis, the US primarily targeted military bases and missile launchers in southern and central Iran, while Israel focused its operations in the north. Minab’s location in the south, near the Strait of Hormuz, places it within the US military’s primary area of operations and lines up with other US strikes on the Bandar Abbas Naval Base about 80km west of Minab, and facilities in Konarak 400km to the southeast. Wikipedia

CBS News reported Friday that Israel was not operating in the area, with an Israeli source confirming the Israeli Air Force was not conducting operations near the school. CBS News

Key Fact #5: The School Had Been Clearly Civilian for a Decade

Reports from New Lines Magazine and Al Jazeera determined that the girls’ school had been “clearly separate” from the adjacent military site for at least 10 years. Historical satellite imagery shows the school building was part of the IRGC compound in 2013 but had been walled off and converted by September 2016, bearing clear hallmarks of a civilian educational facility including a sports field and children’s murals. Yahoo!

Under international humanitarian law, this means anyone with credible targeting intelligence should have known it was a civilian school. Beth Van Schaack, a former State Department official now at Stanford’s Center for Human Rights and International Justice, told the Times that “given the US’ intelligence capabilities, they should have known that a school was in the vicinity.” Common Dreams

Key Fact #6: The “Iran Admitted It” Claim Is Deliberate Disinformation

Some posts falsely claimed Iranian authorities took responsibility, an admission that never occurred. The fabricated claim originated from a Telegram channel called “Radio Gilan,” whose operators have previously shared posts sympathetic to Reza Pahlavi (the exiled Shah’s son), who has expressed support for Trump’s operation in Iran. Yahoo!

The IRGC’s own verified official Telegram channel, Sepah News, captioned its post on the destruction: “The situation of Minab Girls’ School after the crime committed by the Zionist-American enemy.” Yahoo!

Key Fact #7: UN and International Community Demanding Accountability

UN human rights chief Volker Türk and Human Rights Watch have both called for an independent investigation. HRW’s executive director Omar Shakir stated: “From the killing of over 150 students and teachers to strikes on hospitals full of newborns, every day more evidence emerges pointing to the commission of grave war crimes in Iran.” Al Jazeera

UNICEF confirmed 168 girls were killed in the Minab strike, and warned that at least 20 schools and 10 hospitals across Iran had reportedly been damaged across the broader campaign. Iran International

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Day 6 Update

Day 7 Update

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On 28 February 2026 the United States and Israel launched coordinated strikes on Iran. Six days later the conflict is still ongoing, still escalating and still spreading. Here are six things the last six days has confirmed.

1. Regime change is now openly stated American foreign policy

At exactly 2:30am EST on 28 February, Donald Trump released a video statement on Truth Social. In it he stated plainly that the purpose of the strikes on Iran was regime change. He told members of the IRGC to lay down their weapons or face death. He addressed the Iranian public directly and told them to take over their government when it was all over.

There was no pretence. No weapons of mass destruction narrative that took months to build. No resolution passed through the Security Council. No coalition of the willing assembled for the cameras. Just a straightforward declaration that America had decided who should govern Iran and was using its military to make that happen.

For all the talk of international norms, sovereignty and the rules based order, the most powerful nation on earth has stated openly that it will remove the government of another sovereign state by force if it chooses to. And the response from America’s European allies has been to fall in line.

2. The West still deliberately targets children

Within the first 24 hours of strikes on Iran, reports of civilian casualties began to emerge. This is not a surprise to anyone who has watched what happened in Gaza, or in Iraq before that, or in Afghanistan before that.

The pattern is always the same. Strikes are described as precise and targeted. The language used is clinical. Military infrastructure, command centres, strategic assets. And then the images emerge of what those strikes actually hit.

Lebanese health authorities confirmed that those killed in Lebanon in the first 24 hours of the conflict expanding there included seven children. This was not reported as a major story. It was a footnote in the rolling coverage of missile exchanges and interceptor counts.

Abu Bakr Sadiq (ra), the first Caliph of the Muslims, gave the army of Usamah the following instruction before it departed for Syria.

“You shall kill neither a young child nor an old man nor a woman.”

The History of Al Tabari, Volume X, Page 16

This was the standard set over 1400 years ago. The West has not come close to meeting it in any conflict in living memory. The targeting of civilian areas is not a failure of precision, it is a deliberate tactic to break the resolve of a people.

3. American and Israeli military superiority is a myth

Before the strikes began the assumption in much of the western media was that Iran would be dealt with quickly. Two of the most advanced militaries in the world, acting in coordination, against a country that has been under sanctions for decades. The outcome seemed straightforward to many commentators.

Six days later Iran is still firing. Gulf states are running low on interceptors. Trump himself said in his initial statement that the conflict could last four weeks. The USS Abraham Lincoln carrier group is operating under sustained threat. Six American service members have been killed and eighteen more seriously wounded.

This is not the picture of overwhelming dominance that was sold before the first strike landed.

Iraq was supposed to be quick. Afghanistan was supposed to be quick. Both became decades long disasters that ended in withdrawal and humiliation. The idea that military technology alone determines the outcome of a conflict has been disproven repeatedly and is being disproven again now.

There is something in this worth reflecting on beyond the military analysis. Allah (swt) does not grant victory on the basis of hardware alone. History has shown this time and again and the last six days have added another chapter to that record.

4. The western media always works the same way

In 2003 the case for war in Iraq was built around the claim that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction. That claim was false. The war happened anyway. Hundreds of thousands of people died.

In the lead up to the strikes on Iran, Trump stood before Congress during his State of the Union address and accused Iran of reviving efforts to build nuclear weapons. He described their ambitions as sinister. American intelligence reports at the time suggested that the claimed long range Iranian ballistic missile capability was unfounded and that even if Iran had decided to pursue such a programme it would not have the capability until 2035.

The script is identical. The intelligence is presented selectively. The threat is amplified. The media carries it, by the time the bombs are falling and the counter narrative has been established, the original justification no longer matters.

The people who were wrong about Iraq faced no consequences. They are now leading the Gaza task force.

5. Muslim rulers are complicit and are now paying the price

The Gulf states have hosted American military bases for decades. This was presented as a pragmatic arrangement. Security guarantees in exchange for access. It made a certain kind of political sense if you accepted the premise that American presence in the region was a stabilising force.

Iran has now fired on American bases in Kuwait, Qatar, Bahrain and Jordan. It has targeted economic infrastructure across the Gulf. Dubai airport was disrupted. Abu Dhabi intercepted over a hundred drones in a single day. The Gulf states that opened their territory to American military operations are now on the receiving end of the consequences of those operations.

This is not a coincidence. It is the logical result of a foreign policy built on alignment with a power that pursues its own interests without regard for the stability of the region it operates in.

Muslim rulers have been failing their Islamic obligations since 1948. The situation in Iran is another iteration of the same failure. The difference now is that the consequences are landing closer to home.

6. America is making this up as it goes along

On day one Trump stated the purpose of the strikes was regime change. By day two his press secretary Karoline Leavitt was offering a different explanation entirely, saying Trump acted because he had a good feeling that Iran was going to strike American assets and personnel in the region. Those are two fundamentally different justifications given within 48 hours of the first bomb dropping.

Trump said in his initial statement that the conflict would last four weeks. That figure was not explained, not justified and not based on anything that has been made public. It had the feel of something said to sound decisive rather than something rooted in actual military planning.

Six days in there is no definition of what victory looks like. Is it the fall of the Iranian government? A new leadership that agrees to a nuclear deal? A permanently degraded Iranian military capability? Nobody in the Trump administration has answered that question clearly because it appears the question was never seriously asked before the strikes began.

The Senate voted down a war powers resolution but even Republican senators supporting Trump have not been given a coherent exit strategy. The administration’s explanations for why the war started have already shifted multiple times. That is not the behaviour of a government that went into this with a clear plan.

Iraq and Afghanistan both started with stated objectives that quietly changed over time because the original objectives could not be achieved. The difference with Iran is that America has not even managed to get its story straight before the bombs started falling. Whatever happens next, it is being decided day by day.

To not get bombed the world has to hope Trump doesn’t wake up in a bad mood!

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It was reported on 3rd March 2026, that German Chancellor Friedrich Merz, responding to questions about the bombing of Iran, said:

His remarks were echoed by German Foreign Minister Johann Wadephul who stated:

Two senior officials of one of Europe’s most powerful nations; a nation that lectures the world on its post-war moral obligations - openly admitting that international law is a consideration to be ignored when politically inconvenient.

It is clear these values matter little when it comes to bombing other nations for regime change.

Islam has a higher standard. Islam does not chop and change its moral framework based on time, place, or geopolitical alliance.

Last year I wrote about the deliberate and careful avoidance of the word genocide in the context of Gaza. The argument then was that international law, for all its weight and authority on paper, is only ever applied when it is politically convenient to do so. I have shared parts of that article below with an updated understanding regarding the Iran issue.

The legal position on Iran

The United Nations Charter under Article 2(4) is unambiguous. It states that all member states shall refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.

There are two recognised exceptions. The first is a UN Security Council authorisation under Chapter VII. The second is self-defence under Article 51, which permits a state to act if it has suffered an armed attack, and even then only until the Security Council has taken the necessary measures.

Neither of these thresholds, on the face of it, appears to have been met in the context of the strikes on Iran. Yet Wadephul’s response when asked to make a legal assessment was not to engage with the law. It was to defer entirely. “At this point, I am not making a final assessment under international law.”

Carefully chosen words and loose definitions

In politics, the language used is always carefully selected, especially when it comes to addressing the actions of other states. It is an important tool that can be used to express disquiet or even anger to another state in a manner that gets the message across ‘diplomatically’. It is rare to see the public humiliation of other world leaders, such as Zelensky of Ukraine and Hussain of Jordan last year, both at the hands of Donald Trump, but we live in strange political times.

It is common for this language, especially in the Western world, to be tied up in legal jargon as to the exact meaning of a word and when and if it should be used. The legality or not of state actions, in theory, are the foundations of international law.

International law of itself is not a set of pre-written dos and don’ts that all states must adhere to; its make-up is of a complex nature of general principles, agreements based on treaties, and jus cogens (peremptory norms or compelling law).

The peremptory norms are issues of law that cannot be violated by any state (in theory, at least). This means that even if states agree a treaty that violates these norms, then that treaty could be rendered null and void (in theory, at least).

Under Article 53 of the 1969 Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, any treaty that conflicts with a peremptory norm is void.

The full text of Article 53 reads:

Treaties conflicting with a peremptory norm of general international law (“jus cogens”) A treaty is void if, at the time of its conclusion, it conflicts with a peremptory norm of general international law. For the purposes of the present Convention, a peremptory norm of general international law is a norm accepted and recognized by the international community of States as a whole as a norm from which no derogation is permitted and which can be modified only by a subsequent norm of general international law having the same character.

Interestingly the UK House of Commons briefing paper on international law states the following regarding jus cogens:

A status of rules which means they cannot be derogated from. Any treaty incompatible with a jus cogens rule could be void.

The words ‘is void’ have been replaced by ‘could be void’, thus under UK law (according to the briefing paper) a treaty that violates peremptory norms could still be legal. In typical style the UK always gives itself enough weasel room, just in case.

This wriggle room is not academic. It is precisely this kind of deliberate legal vagueness that allows states to sidestep their obligations - whether that is refusing to name a genocide in Gaza or declining to assess the legality of bombing a sovereign nation.

The prevention of genocide was adopted in 1948 under the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, this convention came into force a few years later in 1951 and subsequent global adherence to this meant it become one of the jus cogens or peremptory norms. Genocide is given as an example of a peremptory norm in the UK House of Commons briefing paper mentioned above.

The definition of genocide in Article II of the convention states:

In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnical, racial or religious group

The full text of the convention can be read here, it goes on to state that any person or state enacting acts of genocide can be punished for these actions, there are rules in place for extradition of said persons and that the full force of the United Nations can be used to enact these rules.

Once both these two issues are understood; namely, the definition of genocide and that there are peremptory norms which a state cannot violate; then both the reluctance and the urgency to label the Zionist barbarism in Gaza as a genocide becomes clear.

A global acceptance of the Zionist actions as a genocide would mean an automatic violation of the norms the world lives by and therefore it would constitute a basis for potential action against the occupying Zionist state and or individuals within that state. Genocide does not obligate global action it simply lays the legal foundation for further steps.

It is for this reason why allies of the Zionists even when publicly rebuking its actions are reluctant to use the word ‘genocide’. This is why Joe Biden was rebranded Genocide Joe due to his refusal to label Israel a genocidal state. In fact Joe Biden went out of way to declare what was happening in Gaza was ‘not a genocide’.

The optics, and indeed the legality, of any state such as the Americans or the British doing ‘business’ and selling arms to a state that is enacting a genocide would not look good.

There is method in the madness of avoiding the word genocide.

Does it matter if the murder Gaza was a genocide or if bombing Iran goes against international law?

Having said all of this (there was a lot to get through) does it really matter if the western world regularly flouts international law ?

For all those who naively believe that international law actually holds any moral or political weight it does. Even though occupying forces in Palestine and Kashmir have routinely flouted international law for decades.

It does if we accept that international law is the basis and foundation of all that is good or bad in the world of geopolitics.

It also does if we accept international law as a barometer for when action should be taken against a state carrying out violent acts against others.

As a Muslim the definition of what is a genocide and want is or is not within the remit of international law matters very little.

Islam has a higher moral standard

So what does matter if it is not International Law?

The Islamic standard for when life is to be protected and what is justified in warfare (Gaza by the way is not a war) is way higher than that of current international law.

The obligations to act are not premised on some legal definition of genocide or global political opinion, but simply on accountability to Allah (swt). That is true of individuals, the leader (Caliph) and the state (Caliphate) as a whole.

An example of this is the hadith of Messenger of Allah (saw) that states:

عَنْ عَبْدِ اللَّهِ بْنِ عُمَرَ قَالَ رَأَيْتُ رَسُولَ اللَّهِ صَلَّى اللَّهُ عَلَيْهِ وَسَلَّمَ يَطُوفُ بِالْكَعْبَةِ وَيَقُولُ مَا أَطْيَبَكِ وَأَطْيَبَ رِيحَكِ مَا أَعْظَمَكِ وَأَعْظَمَ حُرْمَتَكِ وَالَّذِي نَفْسُ مُحَمَّدٍ بِيَدِهِ لَحُرْمَةُ الْمُؤْمِنِ أَعْظَمُ عِنْدَ اللَّهِ حُرْمَةً مِنْكِ مَالِهِ وَدَمِهِ وَأَنْ نَظُنَّ بِهِ إِلَّا خَيْرً

Abdullah ibn Umar reported: I saw the Messenger of Allah, peace and blessings be upon him, circling around the Ka’bah and saying, “How pure you are and how pure is your fragrance! How great you are and how great is your sanctity! By the One in whose hand is the soul of Muhammad, the sanctity of the believer is greater to Allah than your sanctity, in his wealth, his life, and to assume nothing of him but good.”

Source: Sunan Ibn Mājah 3932

Grade: Sahih li ghayrihi (authentic due to external evidence) according to Al-Albani

Action to protect Muslim lives starts at the violation of a Muslim’s wealth, honour or life. By using the Ka’bah (the holiest place of worship to Muslims) as an example the Prophet of Islam (saw) is highlighting the seriousness by which protecting life should be taken.

A limit which was reached way back in 1948 when the Zionist state was forced upon the land of Palestine and an obligation to act which Muslim rulers have been failing ever since.

Islam does not only sanctify Muslim lives and ignore all others, the Quran clearly states:

“That is why We ordained for the Children of Israel that whoever takes a life—unless as a punishment for murder or mischief in the land—it will be as if they killed all of humanity; and whoever saves a life, it will be as if they saved all of humanity. ˹Although˺ Our messengers already came to them with clear proofs, many of them still transgressed afterwards through the land.”

[Translated Meaning of the Quran: Al-Ma’idah: verse 32]

This oft quoted verse when it comes to Muslims distancing themselves from being labelled terrorists clearly shows the value Islam gives to human life be it Muslim or not. The irony of this verse is that is was revealed addressing the very people the Zionists claim to now represent the Bani Israel (Children of Israel), yet their actions are a world away from what they were ordained to do.

Even when it comes to warfare that is of one state to another state Islam has rules that protect the women and children, the environment and people of other faiths.

Abu Bakr Sadiq (ra), the first Caliph of the Muslims gave the following advice to the army of Usamah before it left for Syria.

“Oh army, stop and I will order you [to do] ten [things]; learn them from me by heart. You shall not engage in treachery; you shall not act unfaithfully; you shall not engage in deception; you shall not indulge in mutilation; you shall kill neither a young child nor an old man nor a woman; you shall not fell palm trees or burn them; you shall not cut down [any] fruit-bearing tree; you shall not slaughter a sheep or a cow or a camel except for food. You will pass people who occupy themselves in monks’ cells; leave them alone, and leave alone what they busy themselves with……”

The Histroy of Al-Tabari - Volume X - Page 16

This is stark contrast to the behaviour of not only Zionist occupying forces in Gaza but of their mentors the Americans and British in places such as Iraq and Afghanistan and now Iran. Western bombs seem to always mistakenly hit schools or wedding parties.

The Caliphate has a moral obligation to the world to protect those who have no protection, not to sit back and watch as women and children are starved and burnt.

The Quran clearly states that

We have sent you ˹O Prophet˺ only as a mercy for the whole world.

[Translated Meaning of the Quran: Al-Anbya: verse 107]

This is a duty the state carries when propagating Islam to the world not as a colonising tool but as a way to remove the oppression that people live under.

The concept of international law has failed the people of Gaza and Iran in fact it has failed the world only being rolled out when is suits the powerbrokers and ignored when it doesn’t.

Gaza has introduced the world to the darkest of secrets of the current global order, that human life is only sacrosanct if there is political capital to be had. This has been continued into Iran today.

Muslims keep ending up in the same place time and again, yearning to be recognised as the victims of grotesque crimes, holding onto the hope that any of the global organisations will stand up for Muslim lives.

Our lands have now become cannon fodder to be attacked because of the actions of America. When you make a pact with the devil you have to pay the price. We should not bemoan the destruction of facades of freedom built by our rulers, rather the reasons that got us to this point.

My article from last year ended with the following

“Muslims should not be afraid to tell the world that only Islam will save them from potentially suffering a fate just like the Palestinians in the future.”

I take no pleasure in saying I was right, but I was!

If the world does not stop the Zionist blood lust funded and backed by America then who knows which country is next after Iran.

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