IT always feels worse when children are involved, doesn’t it?

No matter what anyone thinks of the late Khamenei’s regime, there is no excuse for a US and Israeli air strike on a school.

The horror of war is never clearer than when you see bright school books in Minab, Iran, scattered among broken bodies and bricks – a reminder of the joyous life these children had just moments earlier.

Behind them, a damaged building, its empty windows like missing teeth, framing a dust-filled sky.

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Anyone would be moved at the sight of weeping men picking through school bags in the rubble, looking for any traces of their daughters.

The bombing, which Amir-Saeid Iravani, Iran’s ambassador to the United States, claimed resulted in the deaths of over 100 schoolchildren, is repulsive.

But it’s the thought of parents dropping their precious children at a sanctuary of learning in the morning, only for them to perish in the afternoon, that really hits home.

We should all hold our children tightly. The thought struck me, especially after last week’s events, and two other experiences.

© The Irish News