Tariq Saeedi
As the war on Iran moves into its sixth week, it is useful to pause and recall the legal standards that the international community has established to limit the conduct of hostilities. These standards are not abstract ideals; they exist to protect civilians and civilian objects even when states are engaged in armed conflict.
A war crime, under international law, is a serious violation of the laws and customs applicable in armed conflict.
The most authoritative modern definition appears in Article 8 of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, which lists grave breaches of the four Geneva Conventions of 1949 and other serious violations of international humanitarian law. The Geneva Conventions themselves define “grave breaches” to include wilful killing, torture or inhuman treatment, wilfully causing great suffering or serious injury to body or health, and extensive destruction and appropriation of property not justified by military necessity and carried out unlawfully and wantonly.
These rules apply to protected persons (civilians, wounded soldiers, prisoners of war) and protected objects (civilian homes, schools, hospitals, places of worship, and cultural property).
Customary international law, as interpreted by tribunals such as the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda (ICTR), and the Special Court for Sierra Leone, reinforces these prohibitions. — It forbids indiscriminate attacks, attacks on civilian objects that are not military targets, and the targeting of infrastructure essential to civilian survival unless it offers a definite military advantage and the harm to civilians is not excessive in relation to that advantage.
In the context of the current conflict in Iran, various reports have documented strikes on objects that, under these definitions, would qualify as protected civilian infrastructure if they were not being used for military purposes at the time of attack. These include:
- Schools, most notably the primary school in Minab where more than 160 children and staff were reported killed in the opening days of the campaign.
- Hospitals and medical facilities, including damage to the Gandhi Hospital in Tehran and other healthcare units.
- Cultural heritage sites, among them sections of the UNESCO World Heritage properties such as Golestan Palace in Tehran and elements of the Naqsh-e Jahan complex in Isfahan.
- Civilian infrastructure such as bridges, power plants, water treatment and storage facilities, and pharmaceutical production sites.
The purpose here is not to render a legal verdict or accuse any individual or state of committing war crimes. That determination belongs to competent judicial bodies after a full and impartial investigation.
The point is simply to place on record that certain categories of targets hit during this conflict fall squarely within the legal categories that international law has long defined as protected.
It is also important to recall a fundamental principle: war crimes are crimes for which individuals — military commanders, political leaders, or others in positions of authority — can be held personally accountable. States themselves are not prosecuted as criminal entities; responsibility rests with the persons who ordered, planned, or knowingly failed to prevent such acts.
This distinction matters.
In any armed conflict, the fog of war can obscure intentions and outcomes. Yet the existence of clear legal benchmarks reminds all parties that certain lines, once crossed, carry consequences that extend beyond the battlefield.
As the conflict continues and the search for de-escalation remains urgent, keeping these standards in view may help ensure that the human and cultural costs already incurred are not compounded by further avoidable harm to protected persons and objects.
The record of what has already occurred — schools, hospitals, cultural treasures, and essential civilian infrastructure — stands as a sobering reminder that even in the heat of war, the rules designed to protect the innocent retain their force.
Whether and how those rules are ultimately applied remains a question for the future. For now, the simple act of acknowledging them is part of maintaining a measure of clarity amid the chaos. /// nCa, 8 April 2026