The Dahiya doctrine is simple:

Inflict huge pain on the civilian population so they urge their leaders to give up.

Sounds logical, but there’s one problem.

It doesn’t work.

The Luftwaffe in 1940 didn’t make Londoners lynch Churchill.

The allies didn’t make the Germans stop fighting by flattening whole German cities.

And the apocalyptic level of violence Israel used in Gaza clearly didn’t succeed in getting rid of Hamas.

That doesn’t mean Israel has learned its lesson, so sadly it’s not entirely impossible these school girls were targeted deliberately to demoralize Iranians, cause a panic, make them turn on their government. It would surprise nobody who’s been watching what Israel has been doing to Gaza.

Minab’s location however points to something else.

It’s close to the Strait of Hormuz, so the US (or Israel) may have been targeting some of Iran’s systems to potentially disrupt shipping lanes. If so this could be some technical failure or mobile missile launchers were in the area.

Even if it was a mistake this does expose once again how very, very lightly Israel and the US take the death of children. Nothing we didn’t know after Gaza, but whatever the cause, it’s still shocking that US officials talk about this with far less shame or regret than a man who’s accidentally scratched his neighbour’s car…

Also, why does the western media immediately give you the faces and humanizing stories of four American soldiers who signed up to learn how to kill others, while doing nothing to try and show the world what these girls were dreaming of on their last trip to school?