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Kyodo

Thirteen-year-old Mohammad Reza Barfar remembers the free kick more clearly than almost anything else on February 28 when the US-led attack on Iran began.
The football-loving schoolboy went to a local field after classes for a match between his village and another team. He scored from a free kick and his brother captured the goal on video.
Hours later, Mohammad Reza was lying wounded amid smoke and debris after a series of explosions struck Lamerd, an industrial city in Iran’s southern Fars Province.
“This was the last time I touched the ball,” Mohammad Reza told Kyodo News, as he showed the video of the goal.
Four pieces of metal struck his body, according to his family and medical treatment records, mangling the sole of his right foot and the heel of his left, and injuring his head and right arm. Damage to a bone in his left leg has left him dependent on a wheelchair.
After the match, Mohammad Reza went to his family’s flower shop and he was resting there when a powerful explosion shook the ground.

“Shortly after, I heard a loud whistle, then an explosion,” he recalled. “I felt someone grab me and then throw me to the ground.”
Brown smoke filled the area so thickly that he could not see or breathe. Then he felt intense burning in his feet. “It was like burned charcoal was on my skin,” he said.
Unable to stand, the boy crawled back into the room until his older brother found him. He spent 28 days in hospital and underwent 16 major surgeries on his legs.
His mother, Zeynab Mortazavi, was also struck by shrapnel and still has difficulty walking after surgery.
“We were a normal family living our lives,” she said. “I cannot understand why the US attacked us.”
Mohammad Reza says he still wants to become both a doctor and a professional football player, but worries about returning to school.

“Other kids might step on my leg. I might get hurt again,” he said.
A few kilometres away, another family is living with a loss that cannot be treated.
Helma Ahmadizadeh was just days short of her 10th birthday when she went to volleyball practice that afternoon.
Although Tehran had come under attack that morning, her parents believed Lamerd was far from the fighting.
Before practice, Helma tried on three different outfits and asked her father, Ali Ahmadizadeh, which one looked best.
“She was very happy, cheerful and laughing,” he recalled.

He dropped her at the Shahid Naimi sports complex shortly before 4pm. Soon afterwards, Helma called him.
“Would you please come pick me up?” she asked. “Definitely, I will come, my love,” he replied. It was their last conversation.
As Helma’s parents prepared to pick her up, they heard explosions. As they drove towards the sports complex, they could see black smoke rising.
“The closer we got, the less hope we had,” Ahmadizadeh said.
They rushed from the damaged gymnasium to the hospital. According to an official medical report, a small tungsten projectile had entered Helma’s upper left chest and penetrated her heart, causing fatal internal bleeding. She had no vital signs on arrival.
“We don’t dare to recall those scenes or describe them,” said Ahmadizadeh.

Her parents remember Helma as an energetic girl who loved sports and singing and led her school choir.
“She was always laughing and happy,” her father said.
A local investigation based largely on security-camera footage concluded that four missiles struck Lamerd beginning at 5.12pm, according to a report cited by Iran’s official IRNA news agency and confirmed to Kyodo News by local authorities.
The blast sites – including near the flower shop and near the sports complex – were found to be at least several hundred metres from the city’s only known Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps post, which is not publicly known as a major missile base or command centre.
A New York Times visual investigation published in March concluded that videos of the Lamerd attack showed characteristics consistent with the US Army’s newly developed Precision Strike Missile, or PrSM.
The newspaper said the missile’s shape, flight characteristics and damage pattern were consistent with the weapon, which can detonate above a target and disperse high-velocity tungsten fragments. A US official also told The New York Times that the missile used was the PrSM.

The PrSM, made by Lockheed Martin, is a new long-range weapon capable of strikes beyond 499km and can be programmed to detonate in the air. The missile used in Lamerd is believed to have dispersed large numbers of tungsten fragments, while Iranian authorities say the attack killed 21 people and wounded more than 150.
But the US Central Command (CENTCOM) said the US forces did not carry out any strikes in Lamerd or within 30 miles (48km) of the city.
For Mousa Mousavi, a veteran surgeon and lawmaker representing Lamerd, he recalls how the “situation was chaotic and critical”.
Mousavi was in the city when the explosions occurred and joined medical teams treating the wounded. Patients arrived with serious injuries to the head, neck, spine, abdomen and chest, while children, women and men crowded the hospital.
“I had only seen such a scene on the front lines of the Iran-Iraq War,” he said.
He said lawyers are gathering evidence for possible international legal proceedings and that, based on what he witnessed at the hospital, those killed and wounded were civilians.
For Helma’s father, no compensation or court judgment can bring his daughter back.
Mohammad Reza’s wish is simpler.
“I wish the war was over forever,” he said.


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A damaged car beside a wall bearing numerous impact marks near the site of a strike in Lamerd, southern Iran, on February 28. Photo: Tasnim News Agency via AP

Mohammad Reza Barfar, who suffered severe lacerations to his left leg. Photo: Kyodo

Ali Ahmadizadeh and his wife, who lost their only daughter Helma. Photo: Kyodo

Smoke rises from a damaged sports hall in Lamerd, southern Iran, following a missile strike on February 28. Photo: Tasnim News Agency via AP

A road bearing fragmentation damage from the February 28 attack. Photo: Kyodo

A man inspects an impact crater from a projectile following a missile strike in Lamerd, southern Iran, on February 28. Photo: Tasnim News Agency via AP

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Moments after the strike on the wedding. Photo: Iranian Red Crescent via AFP

A man and an injured child. Photo: ISNA via AP

Damage at a communications tower. Photo: Tasnim News Agency via AP

Fragments that Iranian media said came from a projectile used in the US strike. Photo: Tasnim News Agency via AP

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Missiles that struck the southern city of Lamerd on February 28 dispersed tungsten fragments, killing at least 21 people


Missiles that struck the southern city of Lamerd on February 28 dispersed tungsten fragments, killing at least 21 people.


Iranians recount horrors of suspected US missile attack on first day of war

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}Missiles that struck the southern city of Lamerd on February 28 dispersed tungsten fragments, killing at least 21 people

Missiles that struck the southern city of Lamerd on February 28 dispersed tungsten fragments, killing at least 21 people