War

Civilians Across the Middle East React to the Iran War: 'A Fear That Settles in Your Heart'

"Now they are hitting everything. Nowhere is safe. But don't worry, we are okay," one Iranian woman texted her American relative.

Matthew Petti | From the June 2026 issue

Share on FacebookShare on XShare on RedditShare by emailPrint friendly versionCopy page URL Add Reason to Google

Media Contact & Reprint Requests

(Saeed Jaras/MEI/SIPA/Newscom)

Amena found out about the war when air raid alarms woke her. Hossein first heard it when fighter jets blew up a radio station as he listened to it. Jad found out about it on the news, two hours before the bombs fell on his neighborhood. And the parents of several volleyball players found out when their daughters were pulled from the burning wreckage of a school gym.

Most Americans have fortunately never seen war firsthand, and most of those who have were troops sent to fight far away. War in your hometown is a strange experience, especially a modern air war without front lines. Things you take for granted, from electricity to the freedom to go outside, disappear. Life's soundtrack becomes sirens and explosions. The danger feels distant until it isn't. Death comes seemingly at random.

On February 28, during a U.S.-Israeli surprise attack, missiles hit an elementary school in Minab and a gym in Lamerd, two towns on the Iranian coast. Mir Dehdasht, whose daughter Robab's high school volleyball team was practicing at the gym, rushed over when a neighbor told him about the attack. "The injured were bleeding heavily, some had lost consciousness on the ground, others were screaming without stopping. Their voices were deafening," he told Drop Site News after learning Robab had died.

Since then, war has touched almost every corner of the Middle East. Reason spoke to civilians from all sides of the conflict in March and April about life under the bombs and the human cost of war. Most of their names have been changed to protect their safety.

Hossein, a young Iranian man who lives with his parents in Isfahan, Iran, awoke on February 28 to hear his family talking about a foreign attack. They tried to leave the city but turned around when a warplane bombed the radio tower along the highway. Hossein heard the sound of the explosion and the radio cut out simultaneously.

"They are bombing really hard. Today at noon they hit a mosque at the end of our street, but thank God we are okay. Love and kisses," Sepideh, an Iranian woman in Tehran, texted her American relative, who showed Reason the screenshots. "Now they are hitting everything. Nowhere is safe. But don't worry, we are okay."

Amena, a Palestinian-American woman living in........

© Reason.com