TEHRAN, IRAN—Less than an hour before a deadly airstrike tore through a residential neighborhood in Resalat Square in eastern Tehran late Monday evening, Hassan Sharifi was walking through the area on his way home. He passed by the mid-rise apartment buildings that housed bakeries, shops, cafes, and small grocery stores on their ground floors. When the missile struck, he immediately ran back to the square.
“I didn’t think about myself,” Sharifi, a 40-year-old accountant, told Drop Site News. “I ran toward the collapsed buildings to help whomever I could. I felt that every minute mattered.”
What he found was devastating. The building facades had been blown away. Balconies had collapsed. Windows shattered. Rubble was everywhere. Inside, where families lay buried under the broken concrete, screams began to fill the air.
At least 40 people were killed, according to official reports. Most of the victims were civilians who had been inside their homes when the strike hit, Iranian media reported.